


No Faraway Shore

by eyres



Series: No Faraway Shore [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-10
Updated: 2016-10-01
Packaged: 2018-08-14 07:12:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 56,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8003245
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eyres/pseuds/eyres
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>President James Barnes has spent his career saying that the defining moment of his life was when he discovered that Steve Rogers had sacrificed himself while Bucky had lain in a New York hospital bed with only one arm. </p><p>Now, Bucky would say it was when SHIELD told him Steve was alive.</p><p>The one where Bucky is President, Steve makes friends and enemies in the future, and a wedding in the Rose Garden has to wait until Hydra is defeated again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Beginning

**Author's Note:**

> This started as a small "wouldn't it be funny if" and turned into several thousand word plot that I wrote while recovering from surgery. My knowledge of US politics and inner DC workings comes from political shows and Google. 
> 
> Thanks a million to my lovely beta, SiriusGrey: she catches all the autocorrects so you don't burst out laughing in a serious moment when someone "tries to school bus face," as well as being sure I'm being honest to the story and the characters. This story is definitely better with her input. 
> 
> Warnings: There will be comic book level violence and romance. Also, in this first chapter, some mild suicidal ideation on Bucky's part.

_The beginning._

 

Bucky is 96 and he has only two regrets.

Well, that's not quite accurate.

There are a whole boatload of years that live in his memory as tarnished brass and shadow and rusted over pain. He tells those years as cautionary tale of what happens when you lose yourself in things you can't control, getting stuck on the past so hard that you can't shake loose all on your own. He tells those years and the story ends with Peggy Carter pulling him up by the back of his pants and punching him so hard across the jaw that it still crackles and pops in the rain some 60 years later.

There are some things he wishes he'd known way back when. He wishes he'd known Apple stock was gonna keep going up and that he'd invested in those McDonald's stores when he had a chance. He wishes he'd known that the dot-com bubble was gonna burst and that Nixon was a liar. He wishes he'd known that there had been a sniper up in a window in Dallas and he could've done more that day besides drive a dead president to the hospital.

In all those wishes and dark parts, though, there are only two things that, if a genie popped out of a bottle tomorrow, Bucky would go back and change.

He dreams about both them, especially in the snowy months. Come first snow, he knows, without fail, which nightmare is going to kick him out of sleep, screaming. If he closes his eyes, he can still feel the train under his boots and the cold air in his lungs. The dream always drops him right there: where he's standing on both feet and Steve is turning and his mouth is starting to crook in a smile and then Bucky sees the bright blue energy. In the dreams, he looks down and his arm gone, severed like an axe chop right at the shoulder, blood slicking everywhere. It's all over the train car in his imagination, coating the walls and the floor and Steve is drowning in it, reaching for him and dying with him.

He wakes up screaming and sweating, his shoulder throbbing in his sleeve. That day on the train, his arm had been taken off in a mangled mess, artery nicked and bones pulverized and muscles shredded. With the side of the train half blown off, Steve had used his belt to make a tourniquet, cursing and praying and pleading as Bucky had bled out under his hands. They didn't know it then, but the only reason Bucky didn't go straight to the angels from Steve's arms that day was the Hydra serum already roaring through his veins and clawing him back from death. Back then, Bucky'd always imagined somewhat romantically he'd just managed to hang on because Steve had never lost a fight he'd set his mind on winning.

In better dreams about that day, Bucky imagines he's able to dodge the blast or he spots the Hydra soldier before. He dreams he shoots the enemy in the head before he even gets his weapon charged. He dreams Steve finishes his smile and they sneak a quick kiss as the train rumbles around a bend.

Even though the first dream is the one that wakes him up screaming, the other nightmare is worse. He wakes up crying from that, sobbing like his heart's been cracked in two all over again and he's dying, except there is no one holding his hands.

This one always begins in the cockpit of the plane. The details are blurry and dark, half-cobbled together from old photos and descriptions and Bucky's imagination because, after all, Bucky never saw the inside of that plane. Steve is there, though, against a blurred windshield that's overlooking never ending ice. He's bright like a torch but Bucky can't see his face. In his dreams, Steve is talking to Peggy and sometimes it matches the recording that Bucky's listened to a thousand times - and sometimes it's some half-crazed thing out of Bucky's head. In the actual recording, Steve says, "Tell Bucky I love him, and I'm sorry, and he's the best man I ever knew." Then the crack in his voice, "Please take care of him, Peggy. He's gonna do great things." In the dreams, Bucky never hears Peggy's reply. He just hears the plane squealing and then a shuddering crash, ice and glass and water rising up. He floats like a ghost as Steve tries, briefly, to fight his way out of the plane and get to the surface. He watches as Steve's movements get more frantic as the oxygen runs out and then Steve is shuddering as his body fights for air. Steve always looks right at him in the dream with that last bit of life held in his eyes. "You should've been here," he says, impossibly, through the freezing ocean. "Why did you make me die alone?" Then the bubbles escape his mouth and his eyes go dead like marbles, still staring at Bucky with betrayal.

Bucky always wakes up crying.

So Bucky Barnes has two regrets: getting his arm blown off so that he was in a fancy hospital in New York City while Steve was fighting, and not being there, in the belly of a Hydra plane, as Steve drowned.

When people ask him if he has any regrets, and they do frequently now, he says the first one. He says he wishes he had been faster or smarter in that split-second moment and maybe he could've changed history. He keeps the second one private, clutched tight to his chest. In the dark nights after the war, he'd cried the truth into Becca's arms and let her stroke his hair and clutch him back just as tight.

Outside of her, it's something he's never shared in the countless interviews and debates and speeches he's done since that day. When he got into politics (just 18 years after Peggy slugged him across the jaw, dragged him back to Becca and they both told him Steve wouldn't want him to waste his life in a gutter), he'd known that people would ask about Steve, about that day, and he's gotten good at his answers. He tried, for a long time, to simply not talk about it - but when you're in the public eye and representing people, they want to see you bleed.

He points to the second regret as the defining moment in his life. True, he had wallowed for years after in a pit of grief, anger, self-pity, and indecision; torn between going on and giving up. When, however, he had finally picked himself up again (with the help of Peggy and Becca), it was because of that regret. While the person dearest to him had been choking out last words and driving a plane into ice and ocean, Bucky had been on the sidelines, lying helpless in a hospital bed. The fear of being left behind again and the need to live up to Steve’s last words have driven him forward throughout the rest of his long career.

Of course, everyone has heard the recording of Steve's final moments. That audio snippet has been played and replayed thousands of times since the war as the ultimate example of American courage. Bucky's been on too many TV and radio shows where they think it's a good idea to play that clip, remind everyone of everything Bucky lost and remind the public that Captain America was talking about Bucky Barnes in his last moments.

"Is it still hard to hear those words?" Some morning show anchor had asked him once when he had been running for governor of New York.

"It never gets any easier," Bucky had said, past the lump. He'd learned by then to school his face. "Don't expect it ever will."

Of course, all of that had been _before_ it had become public knowledge that they had been in love.

Bucky had come out as gay while running for his second term as governor. It had been the ‘90s by then and Bucky'd decided it couldn't wait any longer. By that point, Natasha had been his head of security (she'd defected from Russia in '96 and Peggy had told Bucky to hire her since "they were two peas in a pod") and she had been furious at the risk he'd taken. She'd been on edge for months. To Bucky's pleasant surprise though, while there had been some threats, most of his constituents were supportive. Of course, if he'd been governor of somewhere besides New York, it may have been a different story.

On the downside, within what seemed like hours, that tape of Steve's final moments had been dragged out and replayed and people had started speculating almost immediately. Three days later, Bucky had confirmed the speculation in a carefully scripted interview with the New York Times. The rest of the campaign had been dominated by questions about Steve.

Suddenly, Bucky wasn't just the "right hand and best friend of Captain America," he was also the "secret lover." Peggy released a statement saying she had always known (she had - Steve couldn't tell a lie to a pretty girl to save his own hide) and that she was glad people were able to be more open now. Peggy had married a handsome man, named Thomas Meyer, and had a passel of kids and grandkids and maybe one great-grand baby on the way. They were all beautiful and whip-smart and Bucky was just a little afraid of all of them.

For her part, Becca had kissed him on both cheeks, even when her husband had been slower to come around. His nieces and nephews, mostly adults by that point, had all been supportive. The boy Becca had named Steven had sent him a letter from California, saying how he'd always been proud of his namesake, and now he was even prouder. When he and his wife had a son later that year, they named him James Grant and Bucky had cried.

By the time that Bucky had finished his third term as governor and decided to try private life for a bit, his and Steve's lives had been picked over as the greatest queer historical romance since Alexander the Great and Hephaestion. Sometimes it was hard to see all those precious memories dragged up for public consumption, but there was a little golden spot deep inside Bucky that glowed whenever he got to talk about Steve. The ability to speak freely after years of carefully watching each word was a rush of liberation.

He'd written his memoirs at the ripe old age of 87, feeling ancient and weary to the bone and looking like he was 28. It had stayed on the New York Times's Best Sellers list for months. When he'd gone on his book tour, Bucky had been touched and moved by all the men and women who came and told him how much their story had given them the courage to be themselves. Steve would've been proud.

Running for president had never been a part of his plan. Though, if he's honest, there really never _had_ been a plan in the first place, besides doing some good before he got to join Steve again. The serum had ruined the latter half of that plan for the time being - so here he was. After the Battle of New York people were starting to look for security from more than just things of this world. With Bucky's track record of politics and fighting Hydra back in WWII, there were people out there who thought he was just what the country needed.

It hadn't been an easy choice, though. Bucky had been enjoying being a private citizen again after years in public office. He’d moved into Stark Tower and spent some time fighting the good fight again: running after the bad guys, wherever they were. That freedom would be hard to give up.

Before he had announced his candidacy for presidency (it was right after the aliens had invaded New York and the whole mess with the Tesseract and Loki), he'd traveled via private chopper to Greenland and, from there, had chartered a boat out into the Atlantic.

The captain had taken him to Steve's last known coordinates and Bucky had gone out to the deck, alone, leaving even Natasha below deck. Wind had been whipping across the bow, howling across the rough ocean. His cheeks burned in the gusts and he felt his tears freeze.

Below, the dark water lapped against the edges of the boat with white-frothed edges bursting like tiny explosions. Bucky gripped the railing, leaning as far as he dared over the edge. Until Howard had died, they had made this trip together every year. And, every year, when they failed to find any trace of a plane, there always came this moment when he leaned over the edge and stared down at the black water and thought about slipping under the surface. It would be cold, burning down to his bones. The salt water would blur his vision and the current would drag him under, taking him back to the only home he had ever known. He imagines, lungs aching for nonexistent oxygen, that he would see the great hulk of the plane, see the bright blond of Steve's hair.  There, he thinks, he would find peace.

"Steve," he had said, 94 and exhausted. "I wish you were here. I want you to be proud." He bowed his head, praying to a man that couldn't hear. "I love you."

He had gone home and had announced he was running for president, standing on the stoop of     the tenement in Brooklyn where he had grown up, alien damage visible across the facade, with Tony Stark on one side, Peggy Carter on the other, and Natasha in a sniper's nest somewhere above. "I had a friend," he'd said to the cheering crowd, "who never gave up and always fought for those who couldn't defend themselves. I've tried, in what small ways I can, to live up to his legacy, to make him proud. And, I would be honored if you would allow me to continue his legacy and serve you as your president.

He wins: not by a landslide, but by a respectable margin that no one will question. It’s more than he had expected, being the first openly gay major party candidate. The balloons and the confetti fall and the crowds cheer and James Buchanan Barnes becomes the next President of the United States. On Inauguration Day, Becca holds the Bible when he’s sworn in and Bucky does his best to only think about who’s there and not who’s missing.

Bucky had never thought that being president would be easy - but, four months in, and he feels swamped by just how much there is for him to do.  He swears that the serum is the only reason he isn’t completely bald. He rarely sleeps more than a couple hours a night and it still feels like he’s running behind. It’s good, important work though - and Bucky can honestly say he enjoys his job.

So when Nicholas J. Fury, Director of SHIELD and general pain the ass, ignores protocol and marches into his office with Tony Stark just behind him, Bucky is more angry about the disruption in his schedule than anything else. Two agents in sunglasses with dark briefcases come in after, looking somber and like bad extras from _Men in Black_. Air Force One is already idling on the tarmac and Bucky's going to be late.

"Mr. President, sir," Fury says briskly.

Tony lounges on the couch and kicks his legs up on the coffee table. "Mr. President," he says, and somehow makes it sound sarcastic.

Bucky caps his pen and rubs his nose. It’s times like this that he can practically feel the gray hairs sprouting at his temples. "What is it? Super secret military operation in New Mexico? Aliens invading New York again?"

Fury exchanges a glance with Stark and then sits down. His face twists and suddenly Bucky realizes he's trying to be sensitive.

Bucky's gut lurches. "Is it one of the kids? Or Becca?" he asks, feeling his heart speed up. He has four nephews and five nieces, eight grandnephews and ten grandnieces, one great grandniece and a couple more on the way. All of his sisters but Becca have passed and last he heard, she was healthy but...

"They're all fine, sir," Fury's aide says.

"Then what's going on?"

"Just tell him, Nick," Tony says. "Theatrics aren't going to make it any better and you know I love a good show."

Fury sets down a case. "Mr. President, we found Captain America's plane," he says.

Bucky's eyes fly to the framed picture of Steve on his desk. It's a professional portrait taken of Steve sometime on the USO tour. When he'd been running for his third term as governor of New York, a group of historians had presented it to him on the steps of NYU during a stop on the campaign trail. It's been professionally and thoughtfully colorized. Bucky thinks the blue of Steve's eyes is just about right.

"Thank you for telling me," he says, and is proud that it doesn't come out even slightly strangled. He turns his back to them, stares hard at the expensive chair and the oak desk and everything that he's accomplished because Steve was taken too soon. "I'd like to be alone now." He thinks of staring into the dark water of the Atlantic, dreaming of Steve deep below and waiting for him.

"Bucky, he's alive." Tony's voice is right behind him. He's the only person who uses that nickname now. Howard had used it, up until the day he died, and Tony had never called him anything but that all through growing up. He'd been a wonder of a child and an amazing adult, despite his infuriating qualities. "We didn't want to tell you until we were sure. This is a big science experiment, even for me. And you have enough on your plate. But he's..."

"Alive," Fury's aide finishes. He steps forward with a folder from the briefcase and hands it over.

Immediately, Bucky flips it open. On the very top, there is a picture of Steve in a white t-shirt with an SSR logo on it. His eyes are closed and his face is relaxed, lips slightly parted. His cheeks have just a hint of pink and his hair is slightly damp around his hairline. He's sleeping. "How?"

"Do you really want to hear all the science right now?" Tony asks.

"Eventually," he says, pointing to Tony. And then to Fury, "where is he?"

"A secure SHIELD facility in New York City." Fury clasps his hands. "We waited to tell you until we had doctors check him over thoroughly. Brain waves look good. He should be waking up in under 24 hours."

"I want him moved here." He wishes for Natasha desperately in this moment, but she doesn't officially work for him anymore and she's off on the other side of the globe on a classified mission for someone at the Pentagon.

"With all due respect, sir, the medical facilities in New York are best equipped to deal with this."

"You said the doctors said he looked fine. Plus, I'm pretty sure there's a multibillion dollar line item in the budget for that fancy office building of yours that just got finished a couple months ago, Nick." Preferably, though, Steve will be moved into the White House - into his bedroom, to be precise.

"Sir..."

"Get it done." Bucky deepens his voice so that there can be no argument. It's not that he doesn't like Fury - but after the mess with the Tesseract, he's never actually trusted him again. He cuts his gaze to Tony, "You'll make sure it happens?"

"Sir, yes, sir, Mr. President, sir. My, you get grouchy when you haven't had your coffee." Tony snaps his fingers to the aide, pulling them all out the door. "C'mon, Agent, we have a Capsicle to transport."

Before he goes to his plane, Bucky sits for a moment at his desk, trying to get his footing. It feels like the entire world has shift, the whole of his life has changed directions. Bucky had thought he had known how the rest of his time on earth would go. He’d never been more happy to be wrong.

 

* * *

 

Bucky gets the call from his chief of staff as Air Force One is headed back to D.C. several hours later. Bucky has been sitting at his desk for the last 45 minutes, just feeling the plane rumble beneath him and listening to the low murmur of his staff just outside the door. Finally alone for what feels like the first time in hours, he pulls the tiny black and white picture of Steve from his pocket. It's small and faded - Steve is probably not quite 19 in the photo, blond hair flopping over his face and squinting at the camera like the sun's in his eyes. Bucky smoothes his thumb across one discolored corner.

When someone raps on the door sharply, he slides the picture back in his pocket before he calls for the person to come in. Some memories are just for him.

An aide steps in, extending a cell phone. "Mr. President, it's the chief of staff for you, sir." He slips out as soon as Bucky's taken the phone.

"Sir, I wanted you to know," Maria Hill says when he's pressed the phone to his ear, "the news of Captain Rogers' survival could be hitting the press soon. He woke up when they were getting ready to transfer him to D.C. and he grabbed a gun and slipped his handlers, made it out of the building. A couple photographers may have gotten his photo when he first got loose. I have people tracking them down now."

"What?" Bucky snaps. The last thing he wants is the glare of the press over all of this. He gets up from his desk, already walking toward his door. The secret service agent just outside looks at him. "We need to go to New York," Bucky tells him. "Let the pilot know." Then to Maria, "Did they get him back?"

"Stark put a tracker in his shoe. He's holed himself up in an abandoned building in Brooklyn. We're trying to keep it quiet from the media but it's just a matter of time until someone spills the beans. He doesn't believe what we're telling him, keeps demanding we tell him where you are. Last thing he knows for sure is that you were laid up in the hospital without an arm." Hill sounds tired over the phone and Bucky wonders when the last time she went home was. "Sir, if I might suggest, come back to D.C.. Let Stark and Fury handle this. If you show up, the press is going to be all over it instantly. The last thing we need is..."

"I'm going," Bucky interrupts. It's not even a question. Wild horses couldn't keep him away. "Sorry, Maria, you'll have to push my appointments for the night. I'll make it back as soon as I can but I'm not leaving New York without him."

He tries to think of what he's going to say to Steve as the plane descends to JFK and he's ushered to a black motorcade. His security detail are all shooting him harried looks as they adjust to this sudden change in plans. He feels bad, but he's been taking care of himself since before most of these men's parents were even walking.

All he can think about is the very last time he had seen Steve alive, 70 years ago. Bucky had been drugged out of his mind and lying on a stretcher in the belly of a plane somewhere in Italy, ready to be flown back to New York by Howard. In all honesty, he doesn't remember much from those frantic moments on the train until he was waking up in a hospital bed in New York, one arm gone and unaware that the greatest loss was yet to come. He does remember that final moment with Steve, bending over him in that plane, just a shadow in the dark.

"You gotta get better," Steve had murmured. Bucky remembers the doctors talking about sepsis and infection and they weren't even sure he'd make it back to the States still breathing, but it'd been his best hope. He remembers Steve holding his remaining hand and brushing hair off his forehead, leaning down in that dark plane and pressing a close-mouthed kiss to his lips in the dark. "I love you. You get well. I'll be home as soon as I can. You be there for me when I get back."

Bucky thinks he had mumbled I love you back - but he can't ever be quite sure. He knows Steve had cupped the back of his head, one last time, then disappeared into the night, lost forever. Until now. Bucky had been so young then: a boy who had been soldier, then a prisoner of war. Then, he had lost his arm and listened to the man he loved willingly die for his country.

The world, after the war, had been empty - a blur of regrets and loss. Bucky had been sick with grief and anger, but he'd pulled himself out, stood on his own feet with the memory of Steve on his shoulders. And now, Steve was back. What to say? How was he to explain those lost years when Bucky had lived in a world where Steve had died? Was that something that could even be put into words? He thinks of the boy Steve had loved and looks down at himself now. Would he even be recognizable?

Stark calls him while he's in the car, after sending over pictures of Steve fleeing the SHIELD HQ. "You were right," he says with no greeting, "when you told me that Steve Rogers was a stubborn son of a bitch."

Bucky feels a laugh come out, unbidden. "He never liked being told what to do." In the pictures, Steve is in the same short-sleeve t-shirt from the first photo, running like his life depended on it.

"It's good you're coming," Tony tells him. "I don't think he would listen to those guys in a million years and the last thing we need is pictures of us tranq'ing a national icon to hit CNN."

"Don't let anyone near him - I'll be there soon." Bucky leans his forehead against the seat in front of him. "How is he? Does he look..."

"He's stubborn and a pain in the ass and all he cares about is you. Seems like the Steve Rogers you always told me about." Tony pauses. "Don't worry, Bucky," he says, quiet so no one around can hear. "He's gonna know you right away. There's not going to be any doubt in his mind."

When Bucky arrives, there are about ten black SUVs, two ambulances, a dozen NYPD squad cars, and a fire engine already parked out in front. Fury is standing in a makeshift command post and a chopper is circling overhead. Bucky can pick out three sniper nests around the building where Steve is and it makes his blood boil.

"I don't think," he says coldly, "that treating him like a terrorist is exactly assuaging his fears, Fury."

Fury scowls right back. "This isn't a rowdy kid, Mr. President. This is a highly trained super soldier who currently thinks the entire world is his enemy. We need to stay in control of this situation or people, including him, could get hurt."

An agent keeps trying to press a bulletproof vest into Bucky's hands and Bucky keeps pushing it off.

"I'm going up there," he announces, raising his voice so that he's sure everyone can hear him. "You better not have any of your men shoot me."

"Sir," the head of his detail says, "we'll need to send at least two men with you..."

"I'm going by myself." Bucky takes off his suit jacket, runs a hand through his hair. "I'll keep a mic on me to call for help if I need it - but that's it. All right? You do not come up until I say it's okay." He looks around. "Do you have a blanket for him?" he asks. There is a cold wind kicking up off the river and the nights are still cool this spring. He doesn't want Steve to be cold.

Someone brings him a blanket and a thermos of hot coffee and an earpiece.

"We'll be waiting on the ground level," his agent says. "And accompany you as far as the first flight of stairs. We'll have men at all the doorways." He sighs and Bucky wonders how much he hates his job right now. "Be careful, sir."

Bucky smiles, pats his shoulder. "Steve won't hurt me," he says. "I think, in that room, that will be the safest I've been in 70 years."

He climbs the stairs, hearing the creak. Steve must've been trying to find their old building, seeking out something recognizable in a drastically alien landscape. Their building, the one they had lived in after Steve's ma had passed, had been condemned and torn down in the ‘70s. This building was one of the last originals in this whole area, about three blocks from the primary school they'd both attended. It would be as close to home as Steve could find.

"Steve?" The top level is dim, just moonlight coming in half-broken windows. He heads to the back, to the defensible corner that overlooks the river.

"Buck?"

The sound of Steve's voice is a sucker punch to the gut. Bucky sways, closes his eyes. He'd never expected to hear that again. "I'm here," he croaks. "It's me. Where are you?"

There is a small shuffle against the rotting wood and a shadow moves behind a door. "It's really you?" Steve sounds hopeful but cautious. "There are a lot of strange things going on," he says. "I just... Are you okay?"

"I'm okay," Bucky asserts. "I just want to make sure you're okay. I'm alone. I have coffee. I know... I'm sorry for the way they treated you." He pauses in the middle of the hallway, holds his arms out to show he has no weapons. "It's me, Steve. I've been looking for you for a long time. I've missed you so much."

Steve hesitates in the shadows a moment longer. Bucky can see just the shape of his shoulders and the tilt of his head, fragments of a long forgotten dream. "I want to believe you," he says so softly that Bucky feels his heart crack open.

"You're Steve Grant Rogers," he says, doing his level best to keep the wobble out of the words. "Your mom's name was Sarah and your feet would get so cold in the winter that you'd line your shoes with newspaper." He fumbles for a second and then pulls a chain of dog tags from out of his shirt. His clank against an old pair of Steve's. They're both almost smoothed down to nothing after years of Bucky worrying at them whenever he's needed a bit of comfort. "Been carrying these with me all this time, just waiting for you to come home like you'd promised."

That seems to do it. Steve steps out into a silver puddle of moonlight, shoulders hunched in the thin t-shirt. His hair is mussed in every direction and dirt is all over the white t-shirt. He's pale and his eyes shine like stars. "Bucky?"

Bucky smiles. He's not 96 anymore. He's 22 and just getting home from Basic and Steve is peeking around the door of their tenement apartment. His heart beats like something wild and free. "Hey, you punk."

"Oh God." Steve falls forward and Bucky barely drops the blanket and the thermos in time to catch him, holding him tight against his chest. Steve is trembling just a little and Bucky can feel each exhale like a brand against his neck, taking him back years to when they were both smaller. Steve lifts his head and kisses him messily, their teeth clack and Bucky can taste the tears. Steve pulls back and wipes his hand across his eyes. The gesture is so familiar that Bucky has to take in a great lungful of air. "I thought... When I couldn't find you, I thought you were dead. What happened? They said... Someone said it's the future. It's 2013? I saw a newspaper and..."

That just reminds him of how angry he is at Fury and SHIELD. Steve's first hours in the future shouldn't have been frantic. They should've been at Bucky's side in a quiet room where Bucky could've slowly acclimated him to all the changes. He should've known he was loved and safe. But he knows that it’s no use crying over spilt milk. He'll just have to make sure all the rest of the hours are good ones. Bucky pulls Steve back against his chest, trying to soothe, and brushes a kiss over his hair. "You might have some catching up to do," he murmurs. "You've been gone for a long time. Almost 70 years."

"I remember crashing the plane and..." Steve's face twists in a familiar way that makes Bucky ache all over. "Did we win? Is the war over?"

"We won," Bucky confirms. He thinks of Vietnam and Korea and Afghanistan and Iraq and doesn't answer the second question. There is no need to throw those burdens on Steve's shoulders yet. "Hydra was destroyed. You did it. You're a hero." You were always a hero, he thinks.

Steve pulls back and looks at him, touches his face, fingertips skimming down his cheeks as if looking for something. The touch is so light that Bucky can't stop the whimper in his throat. "If it's been almost 70 years, how..."

Bucky smiles grimly - that's a story he's never looked forward to telling to anyone. "In Azzano. Zola. He had a half-baked version of the serum that they gave you. He tried it on me. It worked well enough that I don't seem to be aging much at all." Bucky shrugs.

"And your arm?" Steve is touching the prosthesis through the linen of his blue shirt.

"Stark. Wanna see?" Bucky unbuttons his sleeve and rolls it up, showing off the sleek metal plates. "His son, Tony - I think you'll like him - perfected it a few years ago. It's top-of-the-line." He makes a fist and Steve drags his finger along the plates as they tighten and ripple.

"Does it hurt?" he asks, wonderingly. He skims his hand up the whole arm, finding the place where the metal plates meet flesh. His touch is careful and tender, like he's discovering something precious.

"Not anymore," Bucky says truthfully. He wants to stay in this moment: a tiny dark room in Brooklyn with Steve in arm's reach and the world far away. He wants to breathe the same air as Steve and relearn every part of him, memorize him anew. But, there are responsibilities. A nation. "Steve," he says gently. "There's a lot to tell you. Will you come back with me? I want... You'll be safe with me. I swear. We won't do anything you don't want to do. I love you. I don't want to spend another second of my life apart from you."

Steve's face is soft in the moonlight. "You're getting sentimental in your old age, Buck," he says, a gentle tease. "You ain't settled down with a girl in all this time?"

"No girl," Bucky says. It had been the most they could've hoped for back then - one or both of them married with a flock of kids, houses next door to each other, and a pretty wife who'd look the other way when they'd go on long fishing trips in remote cabins and never bring back any fish. "My heart's been gone a long time."

For him, the memories of Brooklyn and army tents are so long ago. They are blurred and faded, well-loved pieces of himself that he holds close to his chest, doing his best to keep them fresh and alive even as the years drag him further and further away. For Steve, the last time they touched would've been three weeks ago, vivid and bright and present.

Steve touches his mouth. "Buck," he says.

"It's okay now," Bucky whispers against his fingers. "While you were," _dead_ , "gone. They made it legal for two men to get hitched and..." He inhales sharply.  When he'd been governor and gay marriage had been legalized, Bucky had gotten ordained online and gone to the courthouse to help marry some of his constituents. The pictures had been everywhere. Bucky had been smiling, glowing with happiness at this victory, even as his heart had cracked in two deep down inside. "There's a lot," he finishes with a laugh, "for you to catch up on."

"You know I trust you, Buck," Steve says, earnest in that way he only is with Bucky. "You know I'll follow you anywhere."

"End of the line," Bucky murmurs, wrapping their hands together.

"End of the line," Steve confirms.

"Sir?" A voice crackles over his earpiece. "We're getting a couple news vans congregating on the perimeter. If we want out of here with no photos, we have to go now."

Bucky looks out the window at the city. He can just see the darkness of the river moving past. "I wish we could stay here," he tells Steve, "but we gotta go. Stick close."

Steve falls into step at his shoulder, still hand-in-hand with him. "Still live here in Brooklyn?" he asks. He sounds almost tentative, like he's feeling out this new life, finding the places he recognizes and discovering all the unknowns, nervous of falling into somewhere he doesn't belong anymore.

"I did, for a long time. Had to move recently for work. Nice big house in D.C. now." Bucky makes sure to go first down the stairs, covering Steve as best he can. He stops. There isn’t going to be a way to keep this secret, of course. It'll come out as soon as they walk out the door of this building. Then it'll be meetings and briefings and the thousand things that Bucky is required to deal with every day now and he won't ever have time to do this the proper way. He'll never have time - but at least he can do it right now. "Steve," he turns and squeezes their hands together, swallowing hard. "I spent years trying to live up to you and do you proud."

Steve's mouth curves up, cheeks dimpling just a little. "I'm always proud of you," he says.

Bucky plows on, like ripping off a band aid. "Few years after the war, I worked for the SSR for awhile - did security. Then I went back to school. Got my law degree on the VA bill and did that for a while. I ran for Congress, thought I'd do some good for folks there." There is so much he's skipping, so many little joys and defeats that he wants to share - moments all through his life that he had wished for Steve to be there or things he'd wanted to tell him, things he'd told Steve's grave in Arlington in his absence. But now is not the time. "Then, I guess people liked me so I ran for governor of New York."

Steve's eyes are wide. He's still squeezing Bucky's hands. Bucky doesn't know whether to be proud or terrified.

"And then, a couple years back, some people convinced me to run for president. So I did. Got sworn in a few months back."

"Of the United States?" Steve's voice goes a bit wobbly. "Buck..."

Bucky smiles. The years they have lost taste especially bittersweet in this moment. But he's dreamed of this moment where he gets to tell Steve of everything that he's accomplished - he just always figured it would be up in heaven somewhere. "Didn't want to tell you since I know how much you hate politicians. I've tried to do things you'd approve of and I'm sure you'll have a whole list of things I've mucked up but I've tried, Steve..."

His words end when Steve kisses him hard, hands holding the sides of his face. God, his hands are huge, fingers reaching back into Bucky's hair, and his palms on Bucky’s jaw.

"I'm so proud of you," Steve whispers against his mouth, and years of longing for Steve lift in that moment, finally satisfied. "So proud. I've always been proud. Always known you'd do great things." He's crying a little - Bucky can taste the salt on his lips. "I wish I could've been here."

Bucky squeezes him tight. "You were," he says. He can't stop the thickness in his voice and it sounds so sappy but he wants Steve to know. "I kept you with me wherever I went. You gave me the strength to do all this. Even when you weren't here."

Outside, the night is quiet except for the flashing lights and the sounds of traffic on the streets beyond. Bucky's security detail closes around them and Steve hands over the gun he'd confiscated from the SHIELD agent. He doesn't let go of Bucky's hand.

"Captain Rogers, I'm sorry about all the confusion," Fury says, in a way that means he's not sorry at all. "We'd really appreciate it if you accompany us back to SHIELD HQ now for a quick briefing..."

"You can brief him in D.C. at a time that fits with both our schedules," Bucky cuts in. There is absolutely no way that Steve is leaving his side tonight. "He's staying with me." He turns to his security detail, purposely showing Fury his back. Let the man squirm a little. "Can you let the pilot know we're on our way? I want to be wheels up as soon possible."

"Yes, sir."

Steve matches him stride for stride back to the car, but then pauses. "My shield?" he asks. "It wasn't there when I woke up." He shrugs and looks so innocent that Bucky has to bite his lip. "I'm sort of attached."

Fury folds his arms. "I believe that's the property of the US Government, Captain Rogers."

That isn't acceptable. Bucky wheels, hand already on the door handle of the SUV. "Fury. Last time I checked, I was Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces. I expect the shield at the White House by the morning." He gets in the car, feels Steve come in behind him.

"Buck," Steve says, voice low and slightly strangled.

It makes Bucky look at him. Even in the dim light of the car, Bucky can see the way Steve is suddenly flushed, pupils blown large. "Oh," Bucky says. Something stirs in his belly that he hasn't really felt in years - almost forgotten, honestly. "You liked that."

Steve presses close. "I loved that, Mr. President."

The words flush up Bucky's face and suddenly his pants feel tight. "Steve," he murmurs, feeling like the ice around his heart has finally all melted away. "Steve."

"Yes, Mr. President? What do you want me to do?" Steve slides down the chair, pressing kisses against his chest and then front of his pants. "Just... Tell me what to do, sir."

Bucky accidentally tears a hole in the leather upholstery of the SUV with his metal hand. One of the perks of being president, though, is that no one will dare to ask him about it later.


	2. The happy interlude.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Bucky spoils Steve.

* * *

_The happy interlude._

 

The first few days after Steve arrives back at the White House are like a dream from which Bucky never wants to awaken.

When they first arrive back in D.C. from New York, Bucky has his personal physician (a kindly, white-bearded man named Joseph Weiss that always reminded Bucky of the old men that sat on stoops in Brooklyn) meet them in the residence to look Steve over. It’s not that he doesn’t trust SHIELD, it’s just that there’s very few people he trusts at all when it comes to Steve.

Steve is very obliging and polite about the exam, even though he quietly murmurs to the doctor it's unnecessary. From the sidelong glance Bucky gets, it’s clear Steve’s just doing this to humor him. "I've been getting checked over by docs my whole life," he says later with a smile when the doctor apologizes for the coldness of the stethoscope. “What's one more?”

Bucky can’t stop his snort. "Yeah and you'd always complain like a wet cat the entire time," he comments from the corner where he’s stationed himself to watch. "Don't let him fool you, doc. This one will give you the shake as soon as you turn your back. One time, he had a bullet in his gut and he walked right out of the med tent smiling like a cat that'd gotten the cream. I hauled him back in there myself."

When the doctor isn’t looking, Steve makes a point to look over and give him the hairy eyeball and Bucky falls into wheezing laughter.

After Steve had been given a clean bill of health (or a "well, I can't find anything wrong with him" at least), Bucky takes Steve back to the private executive residence, leaving the security detail at the foot of the stairs.

He stands back as Steve enters, trying to see the place through Steve's eyes - through the eyes of someone who'd gone from a drafty Brooklyn tenement to a crowded army barracks to a muddy tent on the European front.

Since Bucky had taken office, he’s mostly stayed in the living room and master bedroom. To him, these rooms feel the homiest. He has no family to fill up the bedrooms across the hall, no partner to share the space in the giant closet. Sometimes, Bucky feels lost in the largeness of the residence. It was better if he limited himself to these rooms, pretended everything beyond is something else besides his home.

The living room is done up in creams and powdery grays, with crystal lighting and comfortable chairs and couches. There is a large oak desk on the wall near the unlit fireplace with a marble mantle. Framed photos are distributed neatly across the top of the fireplace and on side tables: Bucky with the Howling Commandos, Bucky with Peggy, Bucky with Becca, Bucky with the entire Barnes family spread out around him, Bucky with former presidents and heads of state. There is a solitary picture of Steve on the desk, a black and white capture of one of the newsreels. On the far end of the room, two tall windows look out over the gardens, drapes partially closed.

Steve lingers over the photographs, trails his hand over the oak desk, and pauses by the view, fingers just touching the window. "It's like a picture, Buck," he says. "This whole place. It's like we'd see in the catalogs or the movies except even prettier." He turns then and all Bucky can see is the blue of his eyes. "But you're still prettier than all of it."

That had been the end of the tour - but at least Bucky finally got to christen his couch.

Without needing to even ask, Maria cancels all but his most crucial appointments for the next few days and so, the morning after Bucky brings Steve home to the White House, he finds his morning blessedly clear of any obligations except Steve himself.

Now, he's awake before dawn and Steve is curled into his side like he's tiny and not a massive super soldier, head tucked down like he's trying to burrow right inside Bucky's chest. He's breathing quietly, soft little snuffs that are warm against Bucky’s bare chest, and his heart is beating a steady rhythm against Bucky's ribs. His cheeks are slightly flushed and, god, Bucky had forgotten how ridiculously long his eyelashes are.

When the sun starts streaming through the cracks in the curtains, Bucky gives in to temptation and gently rubs one metal finger along the delicate soft skin right under Steve's eye, just skimming the dark shadows of his eyelashes.

Steve squirms and wrinkles his nose and then opens his eyes. A slow smile spreads across his face and he rolls closer, big shoulders bumping against Bucky like he's forgotten their in a king size bed and they're just jammed together on an army cot. "Morning," he says and it's like all the years have faded away.

The elegant bathroom off of the bedroom is their first stop once they separate and drag themselves out of bed. The shower, in Bucky’s humble opinion, is the crowning feature with its multiple shower heads, rainfall setting, heated floor, and wall water jets. Steve is a bit overwhelmed but comes up to speed enthusiastically, to say the least.

In the kitchen, Steve is equally horrified and amazed by the assortment of food that's at their fingertips. "But you live alone here?" he must ask at least three times.

"Just me. It's mostly just non-perishables and breakfast foods," Bucky says, rubbing the back of his neck. It's been years since he'd lived on rations or breadlines. He hasn't forgotten those things - but somewhere along the way, he'd stopped comparing his current situation with the one of his youth or the war. Both seem so long ago now. He makes a mental note to check where all the perishable food he doesn't eat goes.

Steve is frowning skeptically at his espresso machine. "What does this do?" He pokes at a couple of the buttons.

"Makes coffee. Here." Bucky grabs a pod from a nearby rack and slides it in place. "You just put this here and pour milk in here and..." He presses a button and the familiar sound of grinding makes Steve wrinkle his nose.

When the creamy coffee pours out into the glass mug, he starts looking a little more impressed though.

Bucky grabs a squeeze bottle of caramel syrup and tops it off, watching the white foam froth against the edges. "Here, try it. Way better than that shit Jones used to brew over the fire."

Steve takes a sip and his eyebrows shoot up into his hairline.

Mentally, Bucky pats himself on the back. Steve always did have a massive sweet tooth. "See?" he crows. "Twenty-first century ain't so bad."

Steve swipes his tongue around his mouth, picking up the excess foam. "Not bad at all," he agrees.

They end up eating breakfast together on the Truman balcony. It’s a clear day and Steve stands against the curved railing to stare toward the Washington monument and the Reflecting Pool, a light breeze throwing his slightly damp hair around. He’s wearing just a t-shirt and jeans that some of the staff had picked out in his size, no shoes. They’re planning on sending over a whole wardrobe a bit later in the day. His hair is longer than Bucky had remembered, the front flopping softly across his forehead so that he's constantly brushing it out of his eyes. At some point, Bucky knows they'll cut it back so Steve looks modern and sharp - but for now he’ll enjoy the youth it brings to Steve’s face.

“Does it ever feel like a dream?” Steve asks, when they sit down. He keeps looking over at the view, like he can’t quite believe it’s real.

Bucky thinks for a moment, watches Steve in the golden morning light. “With you gone,” he says quietly, “I had to make my life about other things. Politics, making a difference, became that. This,” he gestures around them to the gardens and the balcony and the view, “was just the trappings of that life. You, you being here with me, that feels like the dream.”

When he goes into his one meeting that afternoon, Maria smirks at him as she hands him a sheaf of papers for his signature. "You look happy, Mr. President."

As he signs off on the thick form, Bucky thinks back over the last 70 years and tries the compare the warm contented glow suffusing his entire being to anything that has come before. Sure, there'd been happy times in his life - proud moments that he remembers fondly. But this? This is another thing entirely. "You know what, Maria? I really am."

 

* * *

 

Bucky isn't ashamed to admit that he does his level best to spoil Steve over the next few days. He's painfully aware that his schedule is going to be teeming full again soon and he wants to soak up Steve's presence as much as he can. His own memories of the days after the war are all blurred by the loss of Steve, but he remembers longing for peace and gentleness in those days. He wants to give Steve that; give Steve the welcome home he’d never gotten.

He flies Becca in from upstate New York on the second day and she cries on Steve's shoulder as soon as she sees him, kissing both his cheeks, while Bucky sits on the chair across from them, fighting back his own tears. Steve holds her so gently, like she's a fragile doll that could break in his arms.

"I’ve missed you," he tells her, his own cheeks damp. "I wanted to tell you about the program before I left, but I..."

She taps his cheek. "Steve Rogers, that's all been forgiven a long time ago," she says and Bucky sees the fresh grief in Steve's eyes for all the time that he has lost.

Becca has brought all her photo albums and she spreads them out on their coffee table, going meticulously through the four generations of Barnes's, to Steve's abject delight. He coos over each baby photo and gets a little misty when she talks about Steve Barnes and little James Grant.

It's only after she leaves that Steve asks about Peggy. He looks like he’s bracing for a blow, like he’s been putting this off until he could gather up the strength to hear the worst.

"She's alive," Bucky promises, just to get the raw edge out of Steve’s eyes. "She's actually only a few miles from here. Steve... she's sick. She's got, well - they call it Alzheimer's. Remember Mr. Wells that lived up the block, how he'd forget his wife's name and go wandering? Some days, she's right as rain. But other days," he passes a hand over his face. "It's not good."

Steve is quiet for a long time, eyes distant and watching something Bucky can’t see. "I want to see her," he tells Bucky, hoarse. "Soon as she's able."

"Of course." Bucky squeezes his hand.

 

* * *

 

The next day, Bucky pulls a few strings and has the Met stay open for a few hours in the middle of the night, just for the two of them. As the sun sets, they take the chopper up coast. Air Force One would be too conspicuous. They land Marine One at a tiny military airfield a few miles outside of Manhattan, slipping under the radar with a skeleton detail.

All of the museum staff sign NDAs (as far as most of them know, they just have a VIP guest coming after hours) and Secret Service guards all the entrances and exits. He and Steve are able to wander the echoing hallways for hours, alone for the most part.

Somehow, Bucky had expected Steve to eschew the modern stuff and focus on the periods he'd loved before the war. But, as always, Steve surprises him by loving the modern art exhibits, fascinated by the bright colors and chaotic shapes and towering shadows. He spends a long time in front of what looks like, to Bucky, a watercolor of a man adrift in a canoe, a speck of green land behind him.

They walk through the Egyptian section and Steve spends ages just staring at some of the ancient jewelry and mummies. He's also surprisingly fascinated by some of the fashion exhibits.

Bucky only has eyes for Steve. He's been here a few times in the intervening 70 years since the war ended: mostly for fundraisers or other networking events and fancy parties. There has always been a sense of melancholy about the place for him, a sense of loss that Steve wasn't alive to experience this with him.

"Didja ever think," Bucky says, when they're walking toward the service exit at last where their motorcade is waiting, hand in hand, "that we'd ever get to do this when we were kids?" It's starting to feel more early than late, the sky turning from black to gray outside the windows.

Steve laughs. "Yeah, back then I remember you snatched me a brochure for this place from some newsstand and I held onto it for weeks." He gently bumps Bucky with his shoulder, looking a bit starry-eyed. "Thank you for this."

"Anything," Bucky replies. Mentally, he starts making plans for an art studio in the residence: somewhere bright and open and full of every art supply Steve could ever want. Maybe in one of the unused bedrooms.

 

* * *

 

The next day, they disguise Steve as one of Bucky’s security detail and visit Arlington cemetery. Steve looks uncomfortable in the black suit and sunglasses, shoulders too stiff compared to the other agents, even as they ride in the SUV.

At the graveyard, Bucky takes him directly to the Howling Commandos memorial on one of the gentle slopes. There's a few other mourners in the nearby rows, but most only spare them a quick glance.

All of the Commandos are dead now. Gabe had been the last one, passing just after Bucky had been elected president a few months ago. Steve steps out from the detail, so they're shoulder by shoulder as they walk the last few steps to the long wall inscribe. Together, they lay wreaths at the foot of the stone.

“Gabe did some campaign stops for me,” Bucky tells Steve quietly, staring down at the list of names in black marble. “He wasn’t… He wasn’t doing so good, near the end. But, when he came out and stumped, he could charm a whole crowd. Told old war stories. Talked pretty in French.” Something is watery and heavy in his chest and he coughs.

Over the years, the Howling Commandos had been his best and brightest link to the Steve Rogers, the man behind Captain America. They had been with Steve and him the most out of anyone in those last 18 months, through the awful and the tolerable. Their memories were like a balm to Bucky. As they had aged and started slipping away one by one, Bucky had felt his own relative lack of mortality all the more keenly.

He had talked with Gabe, just before the end. It had been December before the inauguration and he’d been in full swing with his transition team, every day a countdown to the White House. But, when Gabe’s daughter had called and said it was looking bad, he’d set everything aside without a moment’s hesitation.

“He’d be proud of you, Sarge,” Gabe had said, raspy over the phone, because he’d never called Bucky anything else. “You know that right? He’d be so proud. I’m sure he’s looking down on you right now. I’ll get up there and he’ll be talking everyone’s ear off on how you’re the greatest.”

Bucky had clenched the phone so tight he’d heard it creak. “Tell him hello for me, would ya?”

“You got it, Sarge.” He’d breathed heavily and then said, “I want you to know, it was an honor. You’re going to do great things. You've done great things.”

They’d hung up a few minutes later when Gabe had tired. Bucky had gotten the call four days later that he had died in his sleep, just a week before Christmas. He’d visited with Peggy that day, held her hand and thought about how everyone was going to see Steve before him.

With Steve next to him now, Bucky smiles a little bitterly. It’s funny how life turns out. Steve is quiet, hands in his pockets and head lowered. He’s wearing those black sunglasses as part of his disguise so Bucky can’t see his eyes, but he can see the way his mouth is tight and his nose is starting to redden up just a little.

“They never stopped saying good things about,” Bucky says when the silence has dragged between them and he wants Steve to smile again. “I guess they forgot what a jerk you could be. Saint Steven, you could’ve been from their stories.”

Steve huffs a little. He rubs at his eyes with one hand, careful not to dislodge the sunglasses. “I’m glad they all had long lives,” he says at last. “I’m glad they all got that. I’m glad you were all there for each other after.”

There’s a giant statue of Steve at the far end of the memorial. Bucky doesn’t point it out and Steve doesn’t ask about it, though Bucky knows he sees it.

The day the statue had went in, Bucky remembers standing in his stiff formal suit and feeling like his insides were being scooped out. He’d been just a junior congressman then. There’s another headstone for Steve, a smaller one on the other side of the cemetery, and that’s the one Bucky had visited when he needed something tangible to grieve over. Though, he’d always keenly been aware that Steve wasn’t under the earth. The cold Atlantic had always been where he'd felt closest to Steve. He supposes they’ll have to do something with both the statue and the gravestone now.

Steve reaches into the small black bag he'd carried from the SUV. There's a flask of vodka and two shot glasses and he sets them on the memorial. Carefully, he pours them both a shot. “To Gabe,” he says and his voice is steady if hoarse.

Bucky takes the other one. “To Gabe.” The vodka burns clean down his throat and Steve pours another.

“To Jim.”

“To Jim.”

The alcohol does nothing for either of them; but, doing the ritual with Steve eases some deep, old knot inside of his gut. They work through all of the men and Steve seems more at peace by the end of it. The drive back to the White House is silent, but when Bucky twists so he can lean against Steve, Steve drapes an arm over him and pulls him tight.

 

* * *

 

The last night before Bucky goes back to his full schedule, he arranges for a dinner for the two of them at the top of the Washington Monument.

He has one of the best chefs in the country flown in to prepare the meal and has the entire place lit with candles. Bucky puts on a gray suit he knows brings out his eyes and Steve wears a simple black suit that fits him perfectly.

When they arrive at the top, Steve gazes around at the candles, the white tablecloth, and the red roses in the center. His hand squeezes around Bucky’s like he’s not sure what to say. “I don’t deserve all this, Buck,” he says, sounding like he did back in Brooklyn when Bucky came home with something that was beyond their means. “I don’t need all this.”

Bucky tugs him forward, admiring how the candlelight turns his hair to spun gold and his skin to honey. “Let me, Steve. Let me do all of this for you. I imagined what I would’ve given you for years. This is my chance.”

Steve sits down across from him at the table, keeping a hold of his hand. “Alright, then.” He gazes out the window to their left, at the wide expanse of the capital sparkling in the darkness below them. “It makes you feel small, doesn’t it? Like you’re just a tiny piece in the thick of it. All of those lives just going on below.”

Bucky looks back at him. “You were never small to me,” he says, the years lost making him honest. “Even when you were a kid and a stiff breeze could knock you over, you were the biggest thing in my whole world.”

Steve’s face is soft and fond, just above the flame of the candle.

They sit and talk for hours. Bucky tells him about law school and his first run for governor, which segues into a story about the brutal presidential primary and how awful it had been. Steve’s face goes tight like Bucky’s talking about the latest bully on the block and Bucky has to make a mental note to keep him away from the comment sections on the Internet.

Bucky tells him about SHIELD and how proud he'd been when Peggy had become Director (Steve’s eyes are wide and so pleased). He tells Steve about when gay marriage had been legalized in New York and how he had marched in the parade and married couples at the courthouse.

Through all of it, Steve watches him and holds his hand. His eyes sad, like he can hear the loneliness of the years that Bucky is careful not to mention.

“There wasn’t anyone?” he says when Bucky talks about watching couples who’d been together for 60 years finally get the chance marry each other. “For you, I mean? In all the years. I would understand, Buck. You don’t have to keep it from me.” He's so earnest that it's almost painful to look at dead on.

Bucky swallows and drops his eyes. “There was no one like you,” he says with as much feeling as he can so Steve will believe him. “In the early days, there were some others. Nights. Just a few. Relationships that were quick and easy - I wasn't good at anything else. And, then, once I got into politics, it was dangerous for my career so I just thought all that was behind me. I had Becca’s kids. And Gabe’s kids and Jim’s kids. Peggy’s kids. I thought that was all the family I needed. After I came out,” he shrugs, “I’m old, Steve. I don’t look it but I’m old and dating some kid didn’t make sense - so I just didn’t. It’s surprisingly hard to find someone with shared life experiences.” He goes for a smile, finally lifting his gaze to look Steve in the eye.

Steve looks somber. “I’m here now,” he says, “I’m right here.”

They talk about his prosthetic arm and all the iterations it's gone through since the ‘40s and how Bucky still wears a skin covering over it in public most of the time because the polls say people think the metal arm makes him look scary.

Steve touches it then, runs his fingers along the plates and caresses the curve of the wrist. "I think it's beautiful," he whispers, eyes luminous in the candlelight, "nothing that is a part of you, Buck, could ever be anything but beautiful."

When the meal is done, Bucky turns on a record of old jazz and they slow dance as the candles burn lower and lower. Steve leans against him and Bucky doesn't say anything when their feet occasionally get tangled together.

They stay up there until the sun starts rising, watching the pink slowly grow and stretch over the green of the capital, the way the white monuments go from gray shadows to something almost ethereal.

When the sun is peeking over the edge, suffusing all the trees with something soft and golden, Steve gently kisses his mouth and says, "c'mon, let's go home."

So they do.


	3. Steve.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Steve adjusts and makes friends.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings in this part for some mild homophobia.

_Steve._

 

Within three weeks, Steve has decided that twenty-first century is overwhelming.

Everything is too bright and too loud and too frantic and Steve constantly feels like he's two steps behind everyone’s expectations. It's not that he's stupid or can't pick things up, like some people seem to assume. He figures out pretty quick how to use that iPhone device that everyone carries around all the time and, a couple days in, he can google with the best of them. He knows that the remote turns on the TV and there is an electronic butler living in the ceiling who goes by LADY.

(Bucky tells him that Howard Stark's son is responsible for the latter and that he had named her LADY as a joke - saying she was going to be the only First Lady to live in the White House during Bucky's presidency).

Their rooms are beautiful and comfortable and Steve only has to mention something that he needs or wants once before it seems to magically appear. He's never sure whether to credit Bucky, the staff, or LADY.

It’s just that, sometimes, the differences between now and the world he left behind are overwhelming. All the electric lights look fake and too bright (Steve tells Bucky this at lunch one day and when he arrives back to the residence that evening, all the lights in their rooms have been swapped out so the walls are bathed in golds and soft yellows that remind him more of home). All the food has a strange metallic aftertaste. For the first week or so, he hadn't even been able to keep anything down, despite the chef's assurances that everything he was being fed was all-natural and organic (whatever that meant). Bucky had specialists brought in and Steve had ended up needing to drink these bland, chalky shakes until his stomach finally started adjusting. Now, he’s able to eat most things - but he still hasn’t been able to get used to the taste.

The clothes they give him all feel synthetic and the colors are loud and garish, an imitation of a color almost. He sticks to neutrals and dark blues as much as he can. There is just so much: clothes, food, blankets, entertainment. There are things Steve never even imagined anyone needing before. Steve came from wartime, and before that, the tail end of the Great Depression. This is a whole new world.

He's gone from tenements to trenches and now he's living in opulence. He's a stranger in a strange land.

What makes it all the harder is how natural and how comfortable Bucky is here - how beautiful he is in this alien environment.

A couple times Bucky and others have alluded to how surprised Steve must've been when he'd first heard the news about Bucky’s election. Honestly, though, Steve can say he's not shocked at all. Bucky’d always been charming and popular and he'd always wanted to help people. If anything, Steve just wonders why it took everyone over 90 years to see what he always saw. Bucky fit into this role like an old glove.

Still, though, it’s apparent just to look at him that this isn’t the same Bucky that Steve left behind. The decades slipping by have left their mark on his face. If Steve had to put a number on it, he would say Bucky looked to be in his early 30s now. That bit of baby fat he'd always carried around his jaw from their youth has smoothed out, defining his cheekbones even more than before. His shoulders have broadened so that he almost matches Steve now.

He wears his hair in a short, well-kept coif that looks so soft that Steve has to spend a considerable amount of time reminding himself he can't run his fingers through it constantly.

The way Bucky dresses has changed too. Years ago, in the tenements with the Great Depression in full swing, Bucky had always cared about what he wore, always made sure things fit properly (unlike Steve, who'd relied on belts and suspenders and bulky shirts before the war and was just glad things didn't rip off of him when he put them on during). Now, Bucky always looks like he’s just stepped from a shop window in Manhattan: everything he wears seems to be tailored specifically for him. His legs go for miles in slim suit pants and his jackets always taper smoothly from the width of his shoulders to the tightness of his waist. Unless they're getting into bed, Steve never sees him in anything less formal than a button down shirt. He never has a hair out of place, his chin always has the perfect amount of stubble, and he always knows the right thing to say. He is poised and confident and Steve adores every bit of him, even as it scares the hell out of him too.

In Brooklyn, back when he was a skinny kid who could barely breathe most days, he'd felt this same way: the fear that someday Bucky would realize Steve wasn't worth it. Now that the entire nation sees how amazing Bucky is, what good is Steve Rogers to him?

So Steve is trying to keep up. He takes copious notes from all the experts that come and talk to him about recent history and technology and modern warfare and cultural sensitivity. He wears what the stylists give him (even when it feels awkward, stiff, and scratchy) and attends all the meetings they send him to and is polite to everyone. He even goes to a head doctor a couple times a week to talk about his feelings. Those meetings go okay. Sometimes it feels like he and the psychologist are speaking different languages and Steve leaves more frustrated than when he arrived.

Bucky is there as much as he can be, but Steve still misses him most days. They eat dinner together every night that Bucky’s available (mostly at the table in the kitchen - neither of them know what to do with all the space in the formal dining room) and Steve goes down to the executive offices for lunch as much as possible. At night, they sleep in Bucky's big bed, pressed close together like they’re kids again, desperate for each other's heartbeat. Some nights, if Bucky doesn't have pressing reading or work, they curl up in the living room on the big couch and watch movies together.

Movies, Steve has decided, are one of the best things about the future. He'd loved them when he was a teen and now that they're all at his fingertips in bright colors, he can't get enough. Bucky enjoys them too - though more than once, Steve glances away from the screen to realize that Bucky is watching him and not the movie, with this soft, wondering look on his face. Steve sees that look other times too, and it almost breaks his heart because in it, he can see the heartbreak Bucky must've lived with for years and years. It makes Steve want to curl close to him and not let go.

So, it's no surprise when Bucky dotes on him - brings him sweets and flowers and, after a few phone calls, his shield. But there is always someone or something else pulling Bucky away. Steve understands, of course - Bucky belongs to the nation now as much as Captain America did. That knowledge doesn't make him feel any less like a useless burden though, once again left behind.

He does the best he can to make sure Bucky doesn't feel pressured by him. After the first night that he wakes Bucky up with his nightmares, Steve tries to sleep as little as possible when Bucky is with him. Thankfully, he doesn't need much sleep and Bucky is up before the crack of dawn every day to go to the Oval Office.

The nightmares are mostly about the war. He'd been having them even before he crashed the Valkyrie and his brain seems to be just picking up where it left off. Most common are dreams of that day on the train; except in the nightmares, Bucky dies in his arms, gasping and screaming. Sometimes he is back in Azzano and Bucky is just a cold corpse on Zola's lab table, eyes wide open and staring at the ceiling. A couple of times, he wakes up in a cold sweat, teeth chattering uncontrollably, from something he can't remember, except for the faintest impression of being crushed beneath ice. Steve figures that's from the plane.

He spends many of his nights sleepless, lying quietly in the dark so as not to disturb Bucky, watching as the shadows creep across the room.

On top of everything, Steve isn't exactly even allowed out of the White House. A bunch of fancy public relations people had done their best to keep the news of Steve's initial recovery out of the press and if Steve ventures out in public, all of that hard work will be undone. Bucky is adamant that he doesn't want him to feel pressured to go public until Steve has fully had a chance to adjust. Steve appreciates the thought, but he's beginning to go a little stir crazy.

They let him visit Peggy, but both visits are cut short when she tires and gets confused. In all truth, they leave him more drained than anything.

So, now, he's wandering down to the large gym that he's been told Bucky’s secret service detail uses for their own workouts. He's been coming down here as often as he can, blowing off all of the steam that comes with being conditioned for war.

The gym is large and clean, with vaulted ceilings and only smelling faintly of sweat and antibacterial cleaner. All the flooring is a thick, padded blue and an obstacle course is set up across one entire side that reminds Steve of boot camp. Steve hasn't tried it yet but he often sees guys running through it. There are weight machines and treadmills and exercise bikes. A trampoline even sits in one corner near a rock-climbing wall.

He pulls up the punching bags today, lines them up in a row in a mostly unused section of the gym, and wraps his hands carefully like one of the White House trainers had shown him. After he had destroyed a few bags, one of the custodians started ordering special reinforced ones for his use. Steve appreciates the gesture.

His hair is getting long and he brushes it out of his eyes before settling into the familiar rhythm against the bulk of the bag. Sometimes, this is the only thing that makes sense in this brand new place. He went from being a warrior and a weapon to a forgotten symbol, gathering dust in a well protected corner - just like his shield, sitting in their study near the bookshelves. To him, just weeks ago, he had been living every day in fear for his life and the lives of his men. Now he is being coddled in every way possible. He went from mattering to being a nuisance.

Of course, Steve is grateful to have woken up here - grateful to have Bucky and bountiful food and safety; grateful for his life. But sometimes, he opens his eyes and expects to still be on a battlefield. Sometimes, he hears a tray crash to the floor and feels himself tense like the enemy is coming around the corner. Sometimes he looks down at his careful notes on the real estate crisis or lists of tech vocabulary and thinks that he's back in Brooklyn, a 4F stamped across his form: unfit for duty, yet again.

Today, when he's on the second bag, a redheaded woman sidles up on his side. "Hey, soldier," her voice is low. "What did that bag ever do to you?" She's pretty with delicate features and she reminds him of Peggy in a way that puts him instantly at ease, despite the lines of danger in every one of her movements.

"Ma'am," he says, stilling the bag with one hand and wiping sweaty hair from his forehead with the other. This is the first time someone's dared to approach when he's been down here. "Sometimes I find it just helps to hit something."

She smiles and offers a hand. "Call me Natasha. And you're Steve Rogers. The whole place has been buzzing since you started coming down here. It’s not often we get to see a real live superhero hanging out in the gym. Everyone’s curious to see what you’ve got."

Steve feels a flush go up his neck and he rubs it in discomfort. "Throwing a punch is about the most of it, ma'am. I've been watching some of the fighting. A lot of fancy stuff. Back in the war, I'd just punch my way out. But there are a lot more moves now that I don't know." He cocks his head at her. "You're not secret service."

"Not as such, no. I'm a free agent. And I owe your president a debt so I stick around as much as I can and make sure he stays out of trouble." She smiles. "Off the books, of course."

"Buck's a good man," Steve looks down. "I'm glad he's had people like you watching over him."

She cocks her head. "He never got over you, you know," she says, something gentle in her voice. "I'm very happy for him that he got this miracle." Then she rubs her hands together. "So. You want to learn how to fight?"

He pauses. So far, the only people who have shown an interest in him have been those employed to do so. "I wouldn't want to impose..." he starts.

"Oh, c'mon. It'll be fun. These guys haven't been giving me much of a challenge. I could use some fresh blood." She winks at him and Steve ends up agreeing before he can change his mind.

They meet a couple times a week, after that. Steve is a quick study and Natasha is a good teacher. Steve finds that he actually loves learning all the new styles of fighting and Natasha's knowledge seems bottomless. Martial arts fast become his favorite, his new body quickly learning the high jumps and flips and turns. He loves the elegance of the motions and the way it makes him feel light and graceful, something that he has struggled with in this new body since the serum (not that he ever felt light or graceful before the serum, either).

The other guys in the gym still don't join in, tending to give them a wide berth if he and Natasha are training together. Every now and then, Steve looks around and realizes they're all watching as he and Natasha spar. Their gazes never seem friendly, almost like they’re measuring him up for a fight.

"I don't think Bucky's security detail likes me much," he tells Natasha one day, sitting in a corner of the cafeteria.

She makes a complicated face that he can’t read. "They're all the best at what they do," she says. "But they're all Pierce's men."

"Pierce?"

"The Vice President," she clarifies. "His dad was president back in the ‘80s and a lot of people thought he was a shoo-in for president during the last election. Then your boy announced his candidacy and beat him in the primary. He took Pierce as his running mate to keep the party elite happy, but there isn’t any good blood between them. A lot of the security team that’s here now was picked specifically by Pierce for the job – their first loyalty is to him."

Steve frowns. He doesn't like the idea of the men tasked with protecting Bucky's life having other allegiances. "Can Bucky trust them?"

"They'll do their jobs," Natasha says. "But I don't trust anyone."

Her words are sour in his stomach for the rest of the day. From what Steve has seen, Bucky keeps his detail at an arm’s distance as much as he can. He doesn’t seem particularly fond of any of them, but he does his best to not make their jobs difficult. They’re all the quiet, silent type - big and somber. They all seem well-trained and professional. Steve doesn’t have an official detail of his own yet - he hasn’t left the White House without Bucky. But, he’s heard rumblings that one is being put together. He isn’t sure how he feels about that. It’s hard for him to shake the idea that he should be on Bucky’s detail if anything.

That evening at dinner, he brings up Pierce. Bucky immediately makes a complicated face even as he says, “Alex is very well respected here.” When Steve doesn’t say anything, just waits for him to continue, Bucky lets out a heavy sigh. “He wasn’t my first choice. He wasn’t even on my list, truth be told. But if I had any chance of getting the donors I needed to fund the general election, I needed him on the ticket. We worked out a deal: he keeps his pet projects and I get the support of the party leadership and a good relationship with the World Security Council. He’s a lot more experienced with the inner workings of Washington D.C. than I am and, so far, he’s kept up his end of the bargain.”

“But you don’t like him still.”

“We keep it cordial in public. But he just rubs me the wrong way. He treats me like a child even though I’m older than him. So, I call him ‘Alex’ as payback - he hates that.” Bucky smirks a little and then his face goes dour. “You would hate politics, Steve.”

Steve shrugs. “But I love you - so I’m learning to handle them.” The whole thing continues to sit heavy on him, though. He doesn’t like the idea of the man sitting at Bucky’s right hand having so much sway. After that, every time he sees Bucky’s security detail, he eyes them suspiciously.

Two nights later, Bucky and Steve have their first fight in the twenty-first century when Steve brings up the idea of returning to active duty, either with SHIELD or the Army or somebody (anybody). If he's living in a world where Bucky needs protection, Steve wants and needs to be a part of providing that protection. He thinks it's pretty reasonable. He misses the structure of the military and the feeling of belonging and purpose. Bucky, however, doesn't react well. Steve hates every minute of their argument and he's pretty sure Bucky does, too.

"I can't just be stuck here, Buck," Steve says at last, just tired of fighting. He’s sitting on their sofa his head in his hands. "I appreciate everything you're doing but I'm suffocating and..."

With a sigh, Bucky stops pacing behind him and slides down so they're sitting side by side, legs touching. "Steve, I know. I'm sorry. I just... I think about you going back out there and... It's just that we're _okay_ now. We have other superheroes and weapons and armies and we don't need you. You can just relax. You can do whatever you want. You could go do your art or, or, or... Go back to school. Write a book. Start a non-profit. Do whatever you want. Why do you need to do this?"

At the desperation in Bucky’s voice, Steve takes his hand and presses it to his mouth, lets himself subside. "Okay, Buck. I'll try something else." He runs his hand up Bucky's back and slides it up into his hair. "I'm right here and I'm not leaving you, okay? We're both safe."

Bucky leans into his side, tucks his head beneath Steve's chin, one hand tugging at the dog tags around his neck, a nervous habit that Steve has noticed. "I missed you so much, and I hate fighting with you. I just need to keep you safe for a while. Can I do that?"

Steve strokes his side "Yeah, Buck. Yeah. You can do that."

Two nights later, when he and Bucky are sitting at their table, hands clasped together as they eat the chicken soup the chef had prepared, Steve says, "I think I'm ready to get out in public."  It's high time, Steve thinks, he gets out there where he belongs one way or another, standing alongside Bucky and making sure he’s safe. He may not be able to do it in any official capacity - but at least he can be there.

Bucky squeezes his hand. "Are you sure? You don't have to. I want you to take as much time as you need."

"I know. But, Buck, I want to be out there with you. I don't like sitting in the house just waiting for you to come back. Plus, I've been thinking the spot of First Lady's been vacant long enough. I need to do my part for this country - even if I need to put on the tights again."

Bucky lays down his spoon and sets his hand on the side of Steve's face. "You don't have to," he says again, terribly earnest. "I know how much you hated the dog and pony show of politics. Steve, I just want you to be happy."

Steve knows he means it - knows that he could lounge around and eat grapes all day and Bucky would be the happiest man alive. But Steve hadn’t been made for that, even before he’d participated in Project Rebirth.

He turns and kisses the palm of Bucky's hand, trying to pour every ounce of feeling into it. "You make me happy," he whispers. "Being with you, watching you. No place else I'd rather be than out there, making sure you're safe."

 

* * *

 

They meet with Bucky's press team the next morning.

"It'll be easier," a serious-looking woman says, "if you already have a date set for the wedding when we make the announcement."

"The wedding?" Steve repeats. He casts a look at Bucky, who's fidgeting with the dog tags around his neck.

"The wedding," the woman repeats, then directs herself toward Bucky. "Sir, you've been openly gay for a long time - and it's been mostly non-issue considering the love of your life was Captain America, who had been dead for over half a century. People didn't have to think about you being gay. Polls show that the majority of people believe you ‘were only gay for Captain America.' Now, it's all going to be right in their faces. And the two of you ‘living in sin’ (to borrow a phrase from FOX) together, on top of being gay? You know the conservatives in this country. It'll plummet your polls. So, we need a wedding, the sooner the better. We want the public to believe that you're in love."

“We are in love,” Steve points out sharply. No one looks at him.

"I haven't," Bucky clears his throat and rubs his palms as if they’ve suddenly become sweaty. "Uhh. I haven't even proposed. Or rings... I..."

"We'll get someone out today to do measurements and bring over a selection to choose from. How do you feel about a fall wedding? We probably shouldn't do it at a church... but the Rose Garden should be nice."

Steve squeezes Bucky's hand, wanting to take the wrinkle out of his brow. "Never thought we'd be having a shotgun wedding," he says, trying to lighten the heaviness in Bucky's eyes. "And I'm not even pregnant."

Bucky chuckles, but then goes serious again. "Steve, we don't have to," he says. "I know... I know a lot of stuff about our private lives got put out there without your consent and I don't want you to feel pressured or anything..."

Steve kisses him lightly, but enough to make him stop talking. "I'll make an honest man of you yet, Mr. Barnes," he teases, leaning so that their foreheads touch. "Of course I'll marry you."

By the time they leave the meeting, they've agreed on a color scheme (blue and silver - both of them had balked at red, white and blue) and a basic menu (New American with Irish influences - Steve didn't know exactly what that meant but he liked the idea of his mother's birth country being honored). They also have a list of other things they need to decide on- music and decorations and flowers and a dozen other things that Steve tries to forget about as fast as possible. Steve has a profile lined up with TIME magazine and another with a show called 60 Minutes. They're going to do two joint interviews: one on CNN and one with Rolling Stone Magazine.

The public relations team assures them that there will be more journalists and interviews, but this would be enough to take some of the initial pressure off of them. Steve can only hope they’re right. They also give Steve and Bucky a list of do’s and don’t’s for public appearances. Neither of them is particularly inclined to affection in public but Steve reads over the list dutifully just the same.

When he informs Bucky that, according to the list, they’re not allowed to kiss in public, the other man quirks an eyebrow at him.

“What about the wedding day? I thought that was the whole point.” Bucky is sitting at his oak desk in the living room, going over something on his computer. He’s wearing his reading glasses, which is something else Steve loves about the future.

Steve grimaces and looks back down at the typewritten sheet. He doesn’t know why the team didn’t just email this to him. Everything they want him to read gets printed out and handed over in a folder while he sees them exchanging lightning fast emails among themselves. His email box stays empty. He’s tired of being treated like he can’t understand how to turn on a laptop. “Well, Buck, I don’t make the rules here.”

Bucky leans back in his chair and looks at Steve over the top of his glasses. “No,” he agrees. “I make the rules. And I say, we’re kissing on our wedding day. Also, we get to kiss any other time we want.”

“Is that so?” Steve gets up from the couch and sidles along the side of the desk, leaning back against it so he can look down at Bucky. “Gonna take me out on your fancy front lawn and put a big smacker on me?”

“Only if you keep talking so sweet.” Bucky pulls him down by the front of his shirt and gently kisses him. “Gotta show everyone that you’re mine.”

They do the joint interview with Rolling Stone first - though it won't be the first released. Steve gets a haircut that makes him match all the other men he sees wandering the halls of Washington and dresses in dark blue sweater and light jeans. Bucky wears a light grey jacket over a dark button down shirt and black jeans. Their engagement rings are delivered that morning: both done in gold and carved with the other's name on the inside.  They're fine, but as Steve slips his on, he wishes it had been something he and Bucky had picked out together. He does like how it looks when they hold hands, and the matching bands clack together.

The interview is not terrible. Bucky has clearly had a lot of practice so Steve is content to just follow his lead. They do the interview in their private sitting room and the reporter sticks to carefully inoffensive, human interest questions.

What do you like about the 21st century, Captain Rogers? The Internet is pretty cool. Also movies.  And I like that Bucky is president.

What's the best thing about having him back, Mr. President? I forgot that he can make me laugh like no one else - and just being able to talk to him and have him answer.

When's the wedding date? September 27th, here at the White House. Bucky squeezes his hand when Steve says it.

After, they do a photo shoot, posing in the Oval Office and then out on the balcony, overlooking the south lawn. The photographer had suggested their personal living room, but one of Bucky's PR guys had nixed that immediately.

"We don't want to remind people that they're living together before they're married," he says, sniffing as he pushes his glasses up his nose and peering over his tablet. "One scandal at a time please, Mr. President."

Steve turns just enough to roll his eyes and catches Bucky's eye while he's doing the exact same thing. Bucky turns the eye roll into a wink and Steve feels his mouth twitch up. It all reminds him of before the war, posing for posters telling soldiers to wear condoms and girls to skip stockings and little kids to collect scrap metal. They're an example of values and virtue - dancing monkeys just like Steve had been.

Steve has done the reading too - gay marriage isn't legal everywhere and only been legal in a few states for less than two years. That means that, for some people, Bucky and Steve will be the first gay couple that they can see up close and personal. So they have to do this right. At least, it's better than it was 70 years ago - Bucky's here with him this time and can hold his hand the whole way through it.

For the photo shoot, Steve and Bucky pose like high schoolers at their first prom, holding hands innocently and gazing into each other's eyes. There is one shot of Bucky kissing Steve's forehead and another of Steve sitting on the ground while Bucky runs a hand through his hair. It's sappy and ridiculous but Bucky keeps a smile on his face so Steve does as well.

"You're amazing," Steve tells Bucky later, when they're alone in their big bed in their beautiful bedroom in the White House. Steve joins their hands together so their engagement rings touch. All the lights are dimmed, moonlight coming through the window and making Bucky's eyes look like frosted pools. "I don't... Every day I see you, you surprise me."

Bucky touches his cheek, just a light brush of fingers that makes Steve feel like something precious - like all of this is worth it. "I'm so lucky to have you here. This is everything I could've ever wanted."

Steve's solo interviews are less fun. The journalists are no less cordial but Steve finds it tiresome to spend hours talking about himself without Bucky to bounce off.

They ask about his workout routine and his favorite foods and what music he likes. It's boring. Steve had spent hours reading up on the AIDS crisis and women's rights and gay marriage - but all the questions carefully skirt away from anything political or sensitive.

On a break during one of the interviews, Steve brings this up with the PR guy and he nods his head enthusiastically. "Oh, yes," he says, clearly pleased with himself. "We've strictly warned everyone away from any political questions. So if you get any, you don't have to answer and you can just direct them to me."

Steve's annoyance grows as, when the interview continues, the questions center around his hobbies. He’s really tempted to say "killing Nazis" just to see what will happen. He makes the mistake, though, of mentioning he used to draw back before the war.

The next thing he knows, a paper and a pencil are foisted on him and they're instructing him to draw anything he wants, like he's a little kid or an especially talented parrot.

Later, when a sketch of mini Captain America standing in front of the White House and waving a sign that says "Equality for all" appears in TIME magazine, Steve claims he had no idea they were actually going to use it. He's pretty sure everyone believes him but Bucky.

One of the better interviews he gets to have isn't on the schedule at all. It’s with a group of US History post-docs from Georgetown that are actually just there to tour the White House. Steve is coming back from eating lunch with Bucky and runs into the tour group in one of the back hallways. They're all in their late 20s and it's easy to just start talking to them. Honestly, they're some of the first people that genuinely seem to be interested in what he has to say, besides Bucky.

They start asking him a few questions about the 1920s and the Great Depression.  At some point, one of the girls gets out her iPhone and starts live streaming it. Before he knows it, 30 minutes have gone by, the livestream has almost 200,000 viewers, and he's talking about the underground queer culture in Brooklyn and homoerotic relationships during World War II.

Within a few hours, clips from that impromptu interview are all over the news channels and the PR team looks like they're going to have a collective stroke.

Bucky fairly busts a gut laughing when he hears.

It's not all positive, though. Bucky tries to keep a lot of it from him, but Steve is getting pretty handy with his tablet so he sees all the articles calling them perverts and sinners. It makes Bucky's eyes sad when Steve brings those articles up, though, so Steve carries on the charade and pretends he has no idea.

When there is a protest at the White House gates (men and women and kids waving signs that inform them they're going to hell), Bucky is listless all evening, clinging tight to Steve when they finally go to bed.

"I'm okay," Steve promises in his ear. "I'm here. I'm not leaving you. They can't take me away."

Bucky whispers into his skin about the riots in San Francisco and New York, hate crimes in every state, suicide statistics, and how he watched AIDS destroy lives.

Steve holds him tight and thinks that he should've been there.

 

* * *

 

Natasha is actually the one who introduces him to Tony, despite Bucky’s frequent mentions of the man. "I used to work for him," she explains, as they wait for him to join them in the cafeteria.

"Like you worked for Bucky?" Steve asks, picking at the sandwich in front of him. No matter how many times he comes here, he can never shake the feeling that he's being watched by everyone in this room.

"Before James ran for President but after he was governor, I worked with SHIELD for a time. Fury had me on assignment to watch him. So I was his personal assistant for a few months. He's a good man." Natasha smiles. "Tony's known James since he was born - he helped finance the campaign the first time he ran for governor."

"What can I say?" says a voice from behind Steve. "I believe in James Barnes. Wasn't that the first campaign slogan we went with? In Barnes we trust?"

Steve turns and sees a goateed man in a light gray suit with sunglasses perched on his nose. He's holding a juice box in one hand and a briefcase in the other.

"Hi, Tony," Natasha greets. "You know Steve"

"Haven't had the official pleasure yet - thought I got a glimpse of you while you were playing at Sleeping Beauty. But my, the pictures don't do you justice. No wonder you turn Bucky into a quivering mess of cartoon heart eyes at the very mention of your name." Tony flips a chair around and sits on it backward between them. "So I don't have a real job in this administration, conflict of interest and all that jazz, but Bucky has saved my life a couple, oh, dozen times so I feel like I owe it to him to give my advice wherever I think he needs it. I'm also known as Iron Man around these parts. Maybe you've heard of me?"

"That big flashy suit of armor I keep seeing in the news?" Steve guesses.

"That's right. You might say I design suits. Have you seen The Incredibles yet? Have Bucky put it on your list. He loves that movie. But anyway," Stark taps his glasses. "Stand up and do a twirl for me, will you, darling?"

Steve stiffens a little. "What?"

"I need your measurements. For your suit."

"I'm already... They already fitted me for a suit. For the wedding." Steve looks at Natasha, unbalanced.

"This isn't for your impending nuptials, though, Mazel Tov, by the way. Very excited. My gift will be the biggest one there. You can have the Stark guarantee on that one." Stark opens his briefcase and pulls out a slim device that sort of looks like Steve's iPhone. He sets it on the table and pushes a button.

There is a small jet of light and then Steve can see a perfect miniature of himself, dressed in the red, white, and blue uniform he'd worn when parading across World War II newsreels. A second later, Star Spangled Man starts playing from the device's speakers and Steve can't help but roll his eyes.

"You're still Captain America and Captain America needs an uniform. So," Stark spins his finger. "Twirl."

Steve makes a face but does, lifting his arms obligingly when asked. “Aren’t the stars and stripes a little old-fashioned?” he asks when he sits back down.

“Vintage, Cap. Vin-tage.” Tony snaps up the little device. “Vintage is cool. It’s hip. It’s all over Brooklyn. You’ll fit right in. I promise.”

Steve can only hope he’s right.

 


	4. The Fourth of July.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve celebrates his birthday and other things start happening.

_The Fourth of July._

 

They don’t tell him about the parade until a couple days before. Steve is pretty confident they knew he would back out if they had given him anymore time to think about it. Though, in hindsight, he should’ve guessed that something like this would happen on the Fourth of July.

“The Grand Marshal?” he asks again, trying to inject an excitement he doesn't feel into the words. They’re sitting in one of the conference rooms near the Oval Office, clear glass walls surrounding them. Steve can see the bustle of Bucky’s staff among the desks and filing cabinets. He still doesn’t know most of them. Every times he comes in for a meeting, they all scamper out of his path, peering back at him like he’s some exotic bird that will vanish if they get too close. It puts him on edge.

After he drew that little sketch for the magazine, he’s started carrying around a little moleskine that he grabbed from Bucky’s supply, jotting down notes, dates, and reminders. Now, he starts doodling a monkey, fireworks exploding out of a small bazooka the monkey is lugging in its arms.

The PR guy with the glasses has a whole sheaf of papers that he’s pushing across the table to Steve. If he sees the doodle, he ignores it. “You’ll lead the parade and give a speech. The White House will be hosting a barbecue for veterans and their families on the South Lawn. President Barnes will be giving an address before the fireworks and we would like for you to introduce him.” He looks down and checks his notes. “We’ll have a list of all the dignitaries and prepared remarks ready for you for both occasions sent over to you at the residence this evening - I know you don't have your own staff yet so I assigned one of the President’s speech writers. Don’t worry, both will be brief.”

Steve swallows back a bit of annoyance. They all treat him like some lunkhead soldier. “I’ve done some quick memorizing in my time,” he says, trying not to be sharp. “Whatever you need, I can get it done.”

“We’ll also have a teleprompter set up at both events,” the man continues as if Steve hasn't spoken. “So don't worry if you forget a line.” He pauses. “A teleprompter is…”

“I know what a teleprompter is.” Steve closes his notebook and takes the papers. “Is there anything else?”

The man sniffs. “You will be accompanied by a full security detail and we’d like you to wear the traditional Captain America uniform to both events. The shield too, of course. Will that be a problem?”

Steve wants to ask if he has a choice, but he forces himself to just nod. He feels like a wild animal in the zoo, all chained strength and stripped dignity. If this is what he needs to do to be with Bucky, he can do it.

After the meeting, he goes down to the gym and flings his shield at walls until the place starts filling up with agents at the end of their shift. He doesn't feel much better.

That evening, he sits curled on the couch in the living room, waiting for Bucky to return. He has a book on the Cold War to read and he forces his attention to the pages. His speeches for the Fourth of July sit on the coffee table but he can't bring himself to look at them yet.

It's cool in the room and it makes Steve feel antsy. He hasn't gotten used to all this cold air that's pumped into every room to keep everything at a constant temperature. Summers were spent on hot rooftops, desperate for a hint of breeze, and now he's comfortable in a long sleeved t-shirt in July.

Finally, when the hour ticks past 11 pm, he puts down the book, goes out to the balcony, and lets the muggy summer heat sink into his skin. If he closes his eyes, he can pretend he's on their fire escape, Bucky standing less than a breath away and the whole future is streaming ahead.

“Steve?” Bucky’s steps tread lightly across the balcony. He must've toed off his shoes before he came looking for Steve because he's just in his socks now. “Come inside. It feels like a swamp out here.” Caught between moonlight and the dim indoor lamps, Bucky looks smudged over, blurred by exhaustion and darkness. Still, his smile for Steve is bright and it makes his eyes glow, like the very presence of Steve is enough for everything else to fade away.

Steve takes his hand, presses a small kiss to the side of his head as he draws Bucky against his side. “Remember? We used to go out onto the roof on nights like these. It was too hot to be on the sheets.”

“It was too hot to be anywhere.” Bucky sighs against him. “You miss not having A/C?” he asks, voice light like he's teasing.

“Just not used to it,” Steve says because he's been putting on a performance all day and now he's tired. “Air always tastes off inside.”

Bucky is silent against him. “We could turn it off?” he offers, sounding a little scandalized at the idea. “If it makes you feel better.”

Steve thinks back to sticky sheets and skin on hot nights where it was just the two of them. There's no point in trying to pretend for one night, when Steve knows without a doubt that the time and place are gone for good. “Nah,” he shakes his head. “Wouldn’t want you to melt.”

He lets Bucky lead him inside and only flinches a little when the blast of cold air hits his face.  

“You'll get used to it,” Bucky promises. “It has its benefits. See?” He pulls Steve to the couch and curls around him. “Used to be too hot to do this in the summer.”

They neck lazily on the couch for awhile until Bucky is yawning too much to keep going.

“Sorry,” he says, covering his mouth. “Today was long. I'm not good company.”

Steve had wanted to mention the parade coming soon in just a couple days, how his skin felt too tight most days. He cups Bucky’s face, lets the pad of his thumb drift over the new wrinkles around the edges of his eye. “We can go to bed now, if you'd like. I was just reading this book and waiting for you.”

Bucky yawns again. “No, you're not tired. Keep reading. I’ll just rest my eyes a bit.”

Years ago, Bucky’s ma would say the same thing. Steve smiles but he picks up his book and lets Bucky rest against his side. Before he's finished three pages, Bucky is softly snoring against his shoulder. Steve reads for a bit more and then marks his place, setting the book aside.

Careful not to wake Bucky, he slides to his feet and hoists Bucky up with one arm under his knee and the other around his shoulders. He pauses for a moment, looking down at Bucky’s slack face in the lamplight. If Steve squints, he can almost pretend that no time has passed at all.

Bucky rouses briefly when Steve settles him on their bed. “Steve? What time is it?” he asks, words slurred with grogginess.

“Shh, go back to sleep.” Steve slides in behind him, curls forward so Bucky can feel him. “It's late. Your alarm won't go off for hours.”

Bucky grumbles and then falls back into the steady breathing of sleep, leaving Steve alone with his thoughts again.

 

* * *

 

On the Fourth of July, Steve opens his eyes from the half doze he'd been in when he hears Bucky get out of bed. It's maybe an hour before dawn and the only light comes from under the door.

Bucky gets dressed near the closet, movements careful enough that Steve can tell he's trying to be quiet.

“I'm awake,” he says, rolling over to face him. “No need to tiptoe.”

In the dark, Bucky smiles quickly. “You should sleep in on your birthday,” he murmurs and then crosses the room, bending down to kiss Steve. “Happy birthday,” he says. “At least we won't spend this one getting shot at.”

“Well, day hasn't even started yet.” Steve sits up and stretches. “I have to be at the parade grounds in a couple hours.”

Bucky frowns. “Be careful today, Steve,” he says as he goes back to the closet. “A lot of people show up at these things.”

“I’ll have my shield,” Steve promises. “Don't worry about me.”

The lines don't ease around Bucky’s eyes but he finishes getting dressed. He comes back to the bed and kisses Steve again. “No fights either. I don't want to hear how Captain America started a riot because he felt like getting punched.”

“I’ll see you tonight,” Steve says instead of answering. He laughs when Bucky scowls at him. “No fights,” he promises.

He begins to regret that promise within a couple minutes of arriving at the parade grounds. Humidity is making the uniform Stark had delivered the day before feel like a steam room. The White House PR guy is buzzing around like a particularly annoying gnat. Steve’s security detail is hovering so close that Steve feels like he'd run into them if he turned around too fast.

“I'm fine,” he says, louder than the first couple times he said it, when the PR guy makes noises about sitting him in a makeup chair. Steve wore stage makeup back during the war, and while he's not opposed on principle, he's pretty sure it would just add to his misery in this heat.

The PR guy huffs, annoyed but defeated, joining the ranks of the security detail who'd gone through a similar process trying to convince Steve to wear a bulletproof vest.

“A bulletproof vest isn't going to make me any more bulletproof than I already am,” Steve had argued back at the White House. “I'm fine.”

A guy named Brock Rumlow is the head of his detail today. Steve’s seen him around Bucky’s detail and never liked him much. He just has one of those faces and he’s always barking orders and scowling at Steve like he’s nothing more than an inconvenience. When Steve had put his foot down about the vest, Rumlow had dragged out a liability release form and made him sign it. “If you’re gonna do this, Cap,” he said, the rank sounding like an insult in his mouth. “Then you’re going to make sure your boy isn’t going to sue me when you die.”

Now, Rumlow is standing under the tent, sweat beading on his temple and scowling at Steve like the heat is personally his fault.

What a birthday.

Steve wishes that Natasha were here today at least. She’s been off on some mission near the Black Sea for the past week and he misses her more than he thought he would. He pastes on a smile anyway and shakes the hands of the parade organizers.

A surprising number of politicians and their families show up. Maybe not surprising? Steve has no idea how these things normally go. They’re all in suits with polished shoes and shiny, sweaty faces with shark smiles.

“Captain Rogers,” says the man introduced as a congressman from New Jersey. “So good of you to come and celebrate the day! I don't know if you heard but we have an important bill on defense appropriations appearing before House in about a week and it would go a long way if you…”

Steve tunes out. Thankfully, he’s pulled away to take his place in the parade shortly after that.

As he’s led by the towering red, white, and blue floats with his security detail in tow, the parade organizer grins at him. “We have a special surprise for you, Captain Rogers. We weren’t sure if we’d be able to pull it off - but, well, here they are.”  They round the corner together and a group of old men look up from where they’re seated in folding chairs.

They’re all in dress uniforms and black caps cover their balding heads. When they see Steve, almost as one they stand up and Steve glimpses the numbers on their hats. The 107th.

“All the living survivors you rescued from Azzano,” the parade organizer says proudly. “When we told them what this was for, they all were more than happy to make the trip.”

One of the men steps forward, saluting sharply. “Captain Rogers,” he says, “I’m Captain Titus Bridges. You probably don’t remember but I was pretty sick when you got us out of there. Docs said I wouldn’t have made it much longer. I have three beautiful daughters and six grandkids and four great grandkids because of you.”

Steve salutes back and stares at wrinkled skin and wispy hair. He remembers the eyes, now dimmed with age, in the young face of a private in a dirty Hydra tank as they marched 30 miles back to the Allied line. The kid had been no more than 18. “It’s an honor,” he says, thickly.

The rest of the parade doesn’t go as well. The heat is a living thing, rising up off the black street in huge, suffocating waves, making the shield feel like a steaming iron against his back. Steve sees paramedics assisting at least three people as he’s marching down the route.

At one corner, he hears shouting above the cheers and the marching band and turns his head to see. Over the heads of the onlookers, he sees signs waving. “Protesters?” he asks under his breath to Rumlow, marching just behind him in a military uniform.

“That’s right, Cap. Not everyone is taken in by your boy scout charms.” Rumlow doesn’t look at him. “Thinking you should’ve worn that vest?”

Steve bites his tongue and waves at a little girl screaming over the barricade.

At the parade’s end, Steve is ushered up to the grandstands to give his little speech. There’s a thick clump of press in the front of the baseball hat and t-shirt wearing audience. There hadn’t been so many of them back before the war. He tries to look beyond them, out at the sun-soaked faces of the people who are the children and grandchildren of his peers. They all gawk up at him with phones held up and clap wildly when he’s done with the prepared remarks.

He shakes so many hands and faces blur together against the bright flags. He can smell barbecue and popcorn coming from the fairgrounds. Someone hands him a plate of fried chicken and a bunch of photographers take pictures of him eating while Kevin, the glasses-wearing PR guy, hovers behind them like a tour guide or a zoo trainer. Steve would protest - but he really is hungry.

After that, it’s time to head back to the White House for the reception and barbecue and Steve is ushered back to the motorcade.

Kevin is on his phone, tapping away, when Steve slides into the air-conditioned car, Rumlow just behind him. “This all ran late,” Kevin tells him. “VIP guests are already at the residence so we’re going to need to hurry. Did you go over the list of attendees I gave you?”

Steve nods distractedly. Only one name, though, had really stuck out at Steve when he'd glanced over it last night. Alexander Pierce would be in attendance. “Is the Vice President there yet?” he asks as they turn up the driveway to the White House.

“Let me check… Yes. He just arrived.” Kevin doesn't even look up from his phone as the car's brake outside the residence entry. “Your clothes are laid out in the dressing room. Please change and come to the reception room as soon as possible.”

Steve nods and, as he turns to get out of the car, he catches Rumlow watching him speculatively, blocking the doorway.

 _“They’re Pierce’s men,”_ Natasha had said.

“Is something wrong?” Steve asks, fingers tightening on the straps of his shield. Outside the car, he can hear the rest of his detail moving into position. Beyond that, he can hear music playing from loud speakers and the murmur of a large excited crowd gathering on the South Lawn.

Rumlow cocks his head like a predator. Then he smiles, suddenly genial even if it doesn't reach his eyes.  “Everything is great, sir,” he says and pulls on the handle, climbing out and waiting by the door for Steve to step out. When the door slams behind Steve, he leans close so Steve can feel the heat of him hovering over his shoulder. “Enjoy the party, sir.”

Steve forgoes the main entrance and slips up the back stairs that take him up to the kitchen. There's White House staff there tonight, lining up silver trays of appetizers and flutes of champagne. They all give him wide-eyed looks as he comes through, uniform all sweaty and shield still slung over his back. He nods and slides by them, into the sitting hall.

Down the way, he can hear voices and laughter coming from the formal reception room but he manages to slip into their bedroom before anyone notices him. Just like Kevin had said, there’s a suit laid out for him in the dressing room and he changes into it, barely taking time to splash some water on his face. He’s just going to get sweaty again as soon as he steps outside.

He hasn’t often stepped inside the reception room, even though it’s right next to their living room. It’s beautiful, like the rest of their rooms, but something about the high ceilings and sweeping, curved wall always feel intimidating. There’s a large chandelier hanging down the center and professional flower arrangements on all the tables. Unlike the bedroom and living room, there are no personal photographs or well-worn chairs: everything looks sleek and anonymous.

“There he is!” A rotund man that Steve doesn’t recognize breaks from one of the clusters of people and strides forward. He’s partially bald and orange, voice a nasally crackle. “Captain Rogers! The man of the hour.” He pumps Steve’s hand furiously. “Can I say, what an honor it is to celebrate your birthday with you?”

“Thank you, sir,” Steve nods along. “It’s an honor to be here.”

“Steve.” Bucky’s hand touches his back and instantly Steve feels himself relax, the tension from the parade and the car ride and this room of strangers all draining away. “I see you’ve already met Senator Stern. He’s a good friend of Alex’s.”

Senator Stern nods. “We go way back,” he says. “I have to tell you, Cap, I always thought he’d be president - but, Mr. President, you won fair and square.” He points to Bucky, laughing, and something about it sets Steve’s teeth on edge.

Bucky, though, just slides his hand further around Steve’s back so they’re flush, side by side, and smiles at the shorter man. Steve thinks he's the only one who can see the coolness in it.

“And, since then, we’ve all let bygones be bygones,” a smooth voice says as a tall gentleman steps up to Steve, effectively cutting off Senator Stern. “Alexander Pierce,” he says, offering his hand. “We’ve heard so much about you, Captain Rogers. My father served in the 101st. Thank you for your service.”

“Mr. Vice President,” Steve shakes his hand and meets his gaze. Pierce’s grip is warm and a little clammy, but his eyes are cold and hard. “It’s good to meet you.”

“Alex here,” Bucky says, waving casually at the man, “has been bothering me to introduce the two of your for ages. He’s a big fan.” His eyes cut over Steve’s shoulder.

Maria Hill is there with a phone in her hand. She stretches it toward Bucky. “Phone call for you, sir. I’m sorry. It can’t wait.”

Bucky sighs and nods. “Excuse me.” He leans and presses a kiss to Steve’s cheek. “Don’t start the fireworks without me.” He slips from the room.

Pierce focuses on Steve and smiles as Senator Stern peels away as well. “My niece is the big fan really,” he says smoothly. “Now that she thinks I work with you, I’m suddenly cool in her eyes. Not to mention, Fury’s told me so much that I _had_ to meet the man behind the legend.”

Another piece of a puzzle falls into place for Steve. “You know Fury?”

“Another old friend.” Pierce waves his hand carelessly. “We met in Bogota years ago when we were both too young to be scared of dying. He saved my daughter’s life and I returned the favor by making him Director of SHIELD when I left intelligence for politics. My father, may God rest his soul, finally had enough of me playing cowboy.”

Steve can’t resist asking. “While you were at SHIELD, did you know Peggy Carter?”

“Fine woman,” Pierce tips the champagne glass he’s holding in a salute. “I never had the privilege to work with her directly, but she was a force of nature. I know she’s still missed.” Pierce takes a sip of champagne and then, purses his lips briefly. “Tell me, Captain. Have you thought about joining SHIELD? I’m sure someone of your skills would be appreciated.”

It’s what Steve has been wanting for weeks but something about the way Pierce says it makes him think of dancing in tights with a motorcycle over his head. “I’ve been pretty busy here, Mr. Vice President, but that’s very flattering.”

Pierce nodded and something in his gaze was coldly calculating. “It’s a shame really, wasting your talents like this. You shaped the century, Captain.”

“With all due respect, sir, I don’t consider being with Bucky ‘wasting my talents’.” Steve’s voice is sharper than he intended but he finds he doesn’t care. Sure he wants to be doing something more - but the idea that somehow he’s wasting his life being Bucky rubs him completely the wrong way.

“Of course not,” Pierce raises his hand in a conciliatory gesture. “But you should come by my office sometime, Captain.” He gestures toward the windows. “I’m sure you’ve seen the news. War, chaos, destruction. Superheroes and space aliens. We’re on the brink of something and I want to make sure that you’re on the right side of history. You’d be a valuable asset.”

There’s a noise from the front of the room, interrupting their conversation. “Ladies and gentlemen, if you could please proceed down to the front lawn. We have about 30 minutes until the fireworks begin.”

Pierce smiles and reaches out a hand. “Happy birthday, Captain. Think about what I said.” Then he slips away into the crowd.

Steve pauses against the wall as the rest of the VIPs trickle past him, down the stairs to the stage set up for Bucky’s speech. He feels strangely unsettled, something churning sickly deep in his stomach at Pierce’s words.

“Hey.” Bucky comes up behind him.

Steve turns, leaning back into his shoulder, needing the contact. “Hi.”  He studies Bucky’s profile. There's something tight and worried across his brow that makes Steve want to take him back to their rooms, away from slimy vice presidents, never-ending duties, and loud crowds. “Are you okay?” he asks, in lieu of all that.

Bucky starts and then nods. “Yeah. I'm fine. There's just… this is the first birthday you've been here in so long and I've barely seen you all day. This was never a good day for me, before. Whenever I could, when you were gone, I'd try to cancel all my obligations so I could be alone. I'd go to Coney Island and eat funnel cake and stare out at the ocean. I used to imagine all the things we could've done. Now, you're here and we’re…”

“We’re together,” Steve interrupts. “We’re together. That will always be enough.” He presses a kiss to Bucky’s jaw, bending down just a little so he can smell the sweat on his neck.

Behind them, footsteps are hurrying toward them. They're expected down on the stage soon to introduce the fireworks but Bucky tightens his grip on Steve, squeezing hard as if he's anchoring them both here in this moment.

“You should get down there,” Bucky says, after a moment. He pulls away, smoothing down the sleeves of his jacket. “They're all waiting for you.”

Outside, on the stage at the front of the South Lawn, the night air has barely cooled. It's just past sunset and Steve can see flicks of stars beyond the sterile floodlights. It's a beautifully clear night. On the lawn, families are sitting on colored picnic blankets and the smell of barbecue is still strong. Steve can't really pick out individual faces but he likes the warmth he can feel from their presence. The teleprompter is a bright beacon in the back.

“Happy Independence Day!” Steve smiles when his greeting is echoed back. “Thank you so much for celebrating here at the White House with us.” He swallows and the words continue to scroll on down. “I hope you enjoyed the food and the music so…”

The crowd starts murmuring below him. He can see a couple kids pointing to the left side of the stage and he turns.

He sees the giant cake first. It's red, white and blue with streamers and sparklers. It's layers and layers, almost reaching as high as Bucky. “What…” he manages as Bucky strides across the stage, while the cake is pushed along more slowly by two men in chef hats.

Bucky takes the mic from his hand. “As you may know,” he tells the audience. “Not only is it the birthday of our nation - but it also just happens to be the birthday of someone else. So I thought we could take this opportunity to sing Happy Birthday to him as well. What do you all say?”

The crowd cheers and Steve is torn between embarrassment and fondness as Bucky leads them in a loud rendition of the birthday song. “Happy birthday, dear Captain America,” the crowd sings as Bucky fills in his name. “Happy birthday to you.”

Overhead, there's a sharp whine and then pop as fireworks burst overhead, raining down like a waterfall of sparkles. It drowns out the crowd and the band still playing. Bucky puts a hand on his cheek and leans in close, pressing their lips together. He smells of cologne and barbecue.

Steve slips his hands around his waist and then up his back, cupping his head so that his fingers are deep in his hair. Another firework explodes and when Steve pulls back, he can see flecks of light like stars in Bucky’s eyes.

 _I can do this,_ he thinks, backdropped by the nation and the falling fireworks.  

 

* * *

 

Steve lasts three and a half weeks before he sneaks out of the White House. In Steve’s defense, he hadn’t planned to sneak out of the White House and, it wasn’t actually sneaking. He just didn’t mention it to anyone.

Bucky had kissed him goodbye as usual that morning, while it was still pitch black, and gone off for a meeting with the Joint Chiefs. Normally, that means Steve won't see him again until the evening.

It was late July and Steve had done his best to fall into the role expected of him - but the heat and the press had been wearing on him. He had his own staff and security detail now; they made him feel more claustrophobic than before. Now that he had made formal appearances, it was like the floodgates had been lifted and politicians felt completely comfortable cornering him in corridors and cafeterias with their pet projects, thinking somehow that he was their in with the president. Steve hated their smarminess.

So, this morning, just a couple hours later after Bucky slips out, Steve puts on his workout clothes and started toward the gym - but, on a whim, makes a sharp turn, pulls his hoodie up, and slips past one of the guard gates, the darkness of the early morning covering him. The heat hasn't risen yet and the air is a bit hazy with fog.

He'd only been to D.C. once before the war - some fundraiser for Senator Brandt. He remembers it being dusty and humid and his uniform scratching against his throat as everyone tried to shake his hand. Steve had tried to not feel like a fraud, even as he missed and worried about Bucky desperately.

Now, he jogs to a small organic supermarket a few blocks away that one of the chefs had told him about. He picks out a few pieces of fruit: plums and oranges and mangoes. While he's checking out, he sees his own face on the cover of one of the magazines near the cashier and he ducks his head low while handing over his cash.

From there, he runs toward the Reflecting Pool and the Lincoln Memorial. The sky is slightly overcast, a light breeze coming off of the water. Steve pushes himself to a quick lope, the bag of fruit in one fist as he rounds in front of the Lincoln Memorial.

The sun is just beginning to rise and he finds himself distracted by the bright colors extending over the sky.

"Dude, watch it!"

Steve jerks and wrenches himself, trying to avoid a headlong collision with the man who had just rounded the corner of the Lincoln Memorial. His feet get tangled together and he throws both arms out to keep them from tumbling together onto the concrete. His fruit rolls out of the bag as he steadies the other man and himself against a concrete balustrade.

"Sorry! Sorry. I'm so sorry." He feels a flush spreading up his chest. No one else may be around but he can still feel the fresh shame of having a body that's too big for him to control.

"It's cool. It's cool. No harm, no foul." The other man is smiling, patting Steve's shoulders. "I should've been paying more attention too." He bends down and picks up the paper bag and the plums while Steve grabs the oranges and mangoes. "Sam Wilson," he offers as he hands over the fruit.

"Steve Rogers."

"Yeah, I thought I recognized your face from all those magazines. Must've been weird for you, waking up to all of this."

Steve looks down at the now bruised fruit. "Yeah. It's been an adjustment. Sorry again, Sam." He starts to turn to find his stride again.

"It's the bed, right?" Sam says after him. "Too soft? I was in Afghanistan for two tours. Slept on rocks. Now my bed feels like I'm gonna get stuck in it like quicksand every night."

The words catch him. Steve pauses, turns back, and Sam is smiling gently.

"Look, man, I know you have a lot going on in your life and I don't want to pry. But I know a fellow vet when I see one." He reaches into his pocket and hands over a card. "No pressure, but I'm a counselor down at the VA. You ever get bored in that huge house of yours, maybe come by and give us a hand with come chores. We could use a man of your stamina."

Steve can't stop the chuckle as he slides the card into his pocket. "Oh, this is how you recruit volunteers? Waylay them in front of Abe Lincoln where no one can say no?"

"Something like that," Sam grins back. "Just think on it, man. I'll even buy you a cup of coffee if you make yourself really useful."

Useful. Steve likes that. It's been too long since he's felt that. "Maybe I will. Thanks, Sam."

The quiet morning air is broken by the sound of screeching tires behind him and a bang that Steve will later realize is actually a car door slamming. In that moment though, he's suddenly back in the European theater of war and time slows. His fruit tumbles out of his hands again and he lurches forward, covering Sam with his own body as he takes them both to the ground, wishing desperately for his shield as he waits for gunfire to ring out overhead.

"Captain Rogers," snaps a distinctly American voice.

He looks up. "Rumlow?"

Three black SUVs, lights flashing, are parked on the curb nearby and four agents are hustling toward him, hands on their side pieces. Rumlow is in the lead and he’s scowling, face twisted like Steve is a particularly unpleasant chore. The rest of them have blank faces that make Steve feel like he’s been found inadequate in some key way.

"We got him," Rumlow says into his earpiece, ignoring him. "Repeat, the Star has been secured. Taking him back to the White House now."

Two other agents bodily lift Steve off of Sam, checking him over with brusque hands.

"What are you," he starts. "I'm fine. I just went for a run and..."

"Captain, you need to come with us." The agents haven't let him go, hustling him toward the SUV.

Steve doesn't even have time to look back at Sam.

"What the hell is going on?" he snaps once they've started driving. Then a rush of fear that bottoms out his stomach, "is Bucky alright? Did something happen?"

"Everything is fine, sir," a blonde agent says. "The president became concerned when he couldn't locate you and you didn't answer your phone."

"I was just... I just wanted to go for a run!"

"The president, sir, would prefer if your security detail accompanies you while you are outside the White House."

The words grate across Steve's skin as the motorcade starts back toward the White House. When he'd barely weighed 100 pounds and been rejected by every army recruiter in the area, Bucky had been like this. He's been protective of Steve all of his life. If Steve went outside without his coat, Bucky made sure he heard about it. After the serum, Steve had been the one to save Bucky and had been able to take care of himself. Bucky had still been protective - but he hadn't dragged Steve home like a wayward child. Not like this.

By the time they pull back inside the White House gates, Steve has built up a full head of steam.

Bucky is in the Oval Office with Maria and some other people Steve doesn't recognize. It doesn't matter though: Steve pushes past the security and marches right up to the big desk that Bucky is standing behind.

"What the hell, Buck," he fumes, vaguely aware of Maria and the others politely excusing themselves. Steve's still in his workout sweats and Bucky is wearing a neat collared shirt that's tucked into suit pants, hair brushed perfectly.

Bucky glowers right back. "How do you think it felt," he throws back. "When I walked into our bedroom and you weren't there and you weren't in the gym and no one had any goddamn clue where you were and you weren't answering your phone? I didn't know what happened to you!"

"Bucky, we fought together in a war against Hydra. I'm not 16 years old and getting in fights in back alleys. You can't treat me like I'm a kid." Steve runs his hand through his hair. "You can't do this to me. I can't go back to that. I thought we would be done with this after the war."

They stare at each other for a moment longer and then Bucky sinks down in his chair, puts both hands flat on the desk and stares at them. "The last time," he says thickly, "the very last time you went off on your own, Steve Rogers, you crashed a goddamn plane into the Atlantic and you died. Steve, you died and I thought I was never gonna see you again. I can't have that happen again. I can't go through that."

Steve sits down heavily on the couch and lets the anger drain out of him. "I'm sorry," he says at last. The sun is coming through the window now and Bucky is just a hunched silhouette. "I don't mean to scare you, Buck. But you gotta know that I can't live like this. I've got no right to just sit here and let everyone else do the work. You understand that, right? I thought I could, in the beginning, but I can't. You're gonna have to let me do things, Buck."

"I know," Bucky puts his face in his hands, fingers buried deep in his dark hair. "I'm sorry. I just... In all this crazy world, I just really need you to be safe. There are people who would kill you just because you love me. There is so much out there that..."

"That what, Buck? You told me that the war was over - that we won." Steve gets up, comes around the desk, kneels down so that he can see Bucky's face and wrap their hands together. "What did we lose?"

Bucky turns and brushes a kiss over his forehead, uses one hand to gently cup Steve's face. "I have to show you something," he says in a voice that sounds slightly wrecked, "something I should've shown you a long time ago."


	5. Warnings signs.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve makes a discovery and things escalate.

_Warning signs._

 

Steve doesn’t go running the next day. Instead, just after lunch, he pulls on a casual t-shirt and jeans and a baseball hat and hunts down a member of his detail down on the first floor landing. “I’m going out,” he announces. “I guess I’m supposed to tell you now.” Steve doesn’t even try to hide the bitterness.

It doesn’t seem to bother the man. He nods and speaks briefly into his earpiece and within minutes, Steve is climbing into his motorcade at the back exit.

He’s felt uneasy since yesterday morning when he confronted Bucky at the Oval Office. Bucky has promised they’ll talk again and he’ll tell Steve everything - just as soon as he can clear his schedule. If Steve’s learned anything about the future, he knows that clearing the president’s schedule is harder than it seems. In the meantime, Steve feels like he’s limbo, just waiting for the other shoe to drop. Bucky came to bed late last night, well after midnight. Steve had woken up enough to wrap his arms around him, craving the closeness, but he’d still felt something heavy between them. This morning, he’d needed to just escape.

"Can we go to the VA?" he asks the driver. "There's someone I want to talk to there."

Sam is in the middle of a session when they arrive. Steve makes the detail stay out front in the parking lot and he waits in the hallway right outside the meeting room, listening to Sam talk about grief and loss and letting go.

He vividly remembers those moments in the train when Bucky had been dying in his arms. It was just weeks ago for him, even if it had been decades for the rest of the world. Steve had been so sure that it was over in that moment, that Bucky was going to die right in front of him miles and miles from home, all because Steve wasn't fast or strong enough. He remembers clutching at Bucky's arm as the blood slicked against his fingers, feeling half out of his mind with grief already, even as the train had finally slowed and Gabe had showed up with Zola at gunpoint. He'd carried Bucky off the train and to the rendezvous point, feeling the hot blood trickle down the front of his uniform and begging Bucky to hang on just a few more minutes. There'd been times on that walk where'd he been sure that Bucky had gone and left him. But, somehow, Bucky had held on. The medics had said it was a miracle and Steve had gotten down on his knees and crossed himself for the first time in months.

After that, after knowing what it felt like to be right on the edge of Bucky dying, the choice to fly that plane into the ocean to keep it from delivering its payload to the eastern coast had been a simple one. He'd held tight to that image as he had pushed the plane into the icy landscape: Bucky, sleeping, in a clean white room with the curtains fluttering and the sounds of Brooklyn outside. He'd imagined Bucky doing great things - living his life - and that had been enough as the ice loomed. His life had mattered.

He shudders and realizes the meeting room is emptying out in front of him.

"Hey, man, didn't expect to see you here so soon," Sam stands across from him, open and casual in a way that Steve envies. "You missed the session though."

Steve glances at the people filing out into the hallway, recognizing something in their eyes that he knows is reflected in his own. "I just needed someone to talk to," he says, once they're alone in the hallway. He's leaning against the doorframe, arms folded, feeling like he's trying to hold something large and painful deep in his chest.

"Sure - but you should help me clean up while we talk. I try not to give advice for free," Sam smiles warmly and gestures into the meeting room. He shows Steve where to stack the chairs and then, when they're all stacked neatly against the back wall, pulls out two mops, passing one to Steve. He fills a big bucket with hot sudsy water and they clean the floor together.

"I used to do this," Steve says, as he carefully scrubs at a grease stain. "When I was a little kid. My ma was obsessed with keeping the floors clean."

"Cleanliness is next to godliness," Sam says. "My mama had me doing chores before I could properly walk around on my own."

Steve chuckles. "Ma was never much for religion but she hated a dirty floor. Bucky and I, we'd traipse in there with our shoes covered in mud and she'd have us by the ear as quick as she could." He swipes the mop through a dusty corner and sighs. "She was an angel but she didn't tolerate nothing."

Sam hums. "Seems like she did right by you."

"She died, you know." Steve keeps his head down, fixed on his task. "Just ten years back. Well. Eighty years back or so, I guess. It's hard to keep it straight in my head sometimes." Two images overlap in his head - the one he sees and the one he knows everyone around him sees: a life that is near and so close he can taste it versus a life consigned to the history books.

“There isn’t a ten step program for what happened to you, you know. Waking up 70 years after you died? Going from war to peace like that? You're allowed to not have your head straight on at times. I know I wouldn't." Sam rings out his mop, surveys the mostly clean floor and then sits cross-legged right where he is, motioning for Steve to join him. "Let me tell you, I had a Cap action figure when I was a kid - had the whole Howling Commandos, actually. It was a hot commodity on the playground for sure. We grew up hearing about you. And then when JBB was elected president and everyone knew about you two - well, let me just say, on behalf of the American people, you deserve to give yourself a break for being a little overwhelmed."

Steve finds a smile from somewhere. "JBB? Is that what people call him?"

"Rolls off the tongue, doesn't it? Little catchier than Barnes and no one's gonna be calling the president 'Bucky.' But, dude, seriously. Anyone worth listening to in this country wants the two of you to shack up in a love nest somewhere and bang each other's brains out for a while. Well, as long as there aren’t a bunch more aliens coming from the sky, or something."

"Did you vote for him?"

Sam nods. "Hell yeah. In the primaries too. I figure, a man that's seen us from the Great Depression to the Great Recession might have a good idea about what's right and what's wrong."

There is a last bit of scum on the floor right next to his knee and Steve worries at it with his thumb. "Sometimes, I think he's too good for me now. He needs someone with all those shared experiences. I'm just a kid from Brooklyn who put on a costume and killed some Nazis. Bucky is… Bucky changed the world."

Sam is quiet for a long moment until Steve is almost afraid that he's overstepped his bounds. Then, Sam says, "I lost my wingman, Riley, flying a night mission in Afghanistan. One second, he was right next to me and the next second he's dropping out of the sky like a rock and there was nothing I could do but pick his body up and take it home. Losing someone like that, it's hard. I spent a lot of days wishing that I'd been the one to go down like that. But, let me tell you, if Riley showed up 70 years from now, and not a day had passed for him? I wouldn't care that he couldn't name the last ten presidents or whatever. What Riley and I had, it was soul deep. It wasn't a list of experiences we could compare or some qualities we could tick off, we were brothers." His eyes are a bit wet when he smiles. "And I read JBB's book. That man loved you for 70 years. He's not going to shake you loose just when he's got you back. Any more than you would if the situations were reversed."

The words land and Sam's right, Steve knows. He loves Bucky and something like a 70-year gap wouldn't keep them apart. He brings his knees up to his chest. "I know," he says quietly. "It's just easy to forget that when he's sending my security detail after me like I'm some punk kid making trouble again."

Sam belly laughs for a second. "Steve, if Riley came back tomorrow, I would wrap that asshole up in bubble wrap and store him in a safe if I could - and I'm not the president with a million enemies out to get me. Cut JBB a little slack, he'll come around."

Steve cracks a smile and nods, relaxing a little from his hunched over position. "Thanks, Sam."

With a grin, Sam claps him on the back and pulls him up. "Any time. Come by on a Tuesday next time. I'll have some more work for you then."

 

* * *

 

Two days later, Steve and Bucky take the motorcade to the Triskelion - it’s as soon as humanly possible that Bucky could get a few uninterrupted hours in his schedule. Even then Maria Hill isn't very happy about all the meetings she has to cancel to achieve it, but Bucky is firm.

"This has been put off long enough," he tells Steve when they're both in the back of an armored SUV. Bucky hasn't let go of his hand since they got to the motorcade, as if he's afraid Steve's going to run off again. "And I'm sorry. I just wanted to protect you."

"I'm not an innocent, Buck. We both saw the same things during the war. You can't be innocent after that."

"No," Bucky agrees quietly. "But you... You've always believed in me - always thought I knew the right thing to do. I didn't want to shake that."

Steve leans close and takes his hand. "Whatever it is," he promises. "We'll face it together. Okay?"

Fury meets them in his office on one of the upper floors of the Triskelion. The towering glass ceilings and arching metal framework extending up and up into the sky beyond momentarily awe Steve. "Some office building," he comments as he's handed a visitor's pass by a dour man in a black suit.

"We do our best," Fury says drily.

Bucky instructs the security detail to remain behind and Fury leads them to a service elevator that opens up directly to his office. It's tall and glass and, when Steve looks out the window, he can see all of D.C. spread out around them. He pauses there, taking in the flags and buildings and the monuments.

"It takes my breath away every time," Bucky says from behind his shoulder. "The responsibility. The history."

"Sub-basement level three," Fury instructs the elevator.

"Captain Steven G. Rogers does not have security clearance to access to this floor," the elevator intones.

"Override on order of James Buchanan Barnes," Bucky says.

"Confirmed."

It's quiet for a moment as the elevator plunges downward and then Bucky says, "Remember that old saying from Teddy Roosevelt? My ma used to quote it."

"Speak softly and carry a big stick and you will go far," Steve says. He can see her standing in front of the stove with a big spoon in her hand in his mind. "I think she was afraid my big mouth would get me into trouble."

Bucky snorts. "She wasn't wrong," he says, nudging Steve in the ribs like they're teenage co-conspirators again. The internal elevator lights flick on as they slip out of the sunlight and below ground. "This," Bucky whispers, extending his hand to envelope the cavernous space that they're descending into, "is the big stick."

Steve isn't sure what he had been anticipating. He'd read up on the nukes dropped on Japan to end the war and then the later invention of the H-Bombs and the arms race with Russia. So when Bucky starts talking about war and innocence, the nearest Steve can imagine is something bigger and worse than those bombs - even if it had been near impossible to believe that Bucky would be involved in something like that.

Whatever this is in front of him, though, it’s not bombs. These look like warships or submarines: full up to the teeth with weapons and technology. There must be hundreds of workers climbing all over the metal framework and glass. Giant cranes are moving workers and machinery up and down the sides and floodlights show techs bending over engine guts. This looks like war and destruction.

"We call it Project Insight," Bucky tells him quietly as they step out of the elevator and onto the production floor, the volume of a sinner entering a church. "They're three mobile command and weapons airships, designed to remain airborne practically indefinitely and provide global coverage against threats and natural disasters. All the most advanced radar tech and weapons capabilities are loaded on here. They'll be two miles up in the air and able to see a mouse riding in the bed of pickup truck going down the freeway in a city hundreds of miles away. It'll know the very second that a terrorist steps out of a cave, anywhere in the world. Someone commits a murder or a rape or a shooting and this can direct police and emergency responders to apprehend the criminals and assist the victims. It can predict weather patterns and direct supplies and aid to areas that are in need. It can pinpoint the exact moment and place an airplane crashes or car goes off a deserted road and direct rescuers right to it. It's for protection."

Steve's mouth is dry and, even as Bucky ticks off all the good these airships could do on his fingers, Steve can easily pick up the hesitancy in Bucky's shoulders and the worry in the shape of his brow. Steve turns. "Was this your idea?" he asks Fury.

"Alex Pierce," Bucky says over whatever Fury was going to say, "was the Secretary of Defense before he joined on as my Vice President. Before that, he worked for SHIELD. This was his baby - the project started during the Cold War and got held up for a bit during the ‘90s. The aliens invading New York were the push needed to get congressional funding and get this finished." He hesitates like he's not sure how much Steve wants to hear. "It was mostly done by the time I took office. I've asked for as many reviews on it as I can and everything checks out."

Steve stares up at the towering weaponry, the barrels of huge guns pointing at his head. It reminds him of the Hydra factory in Azzano, great bulwarks of metal made to crush men beneath them. Here, though, there are no Hydra soldiers or prisoners of war - just SHIELD techs in their white coats and glasses scurrying back and forth. "This isn't protection, Bucky." The whir of drills almost drowns him out. "And this isn't a big stick. This is putting everyone on earth in a fishbowl and playing judge, jury, and executioner. You could hold entire countries hostage with this."

Bucky gives him a pained look. "People are scared, Steve. And I'm the one that's supposed to protect them. They are all trusting me to make sure that they’re safe. What am I supposed to do?" He holds up his hands like he's helpless in the face of this.

"Not this." Steve turns on his heel and strides back toward the elevator. He doesn't pause when he hears Bucky call after him. Maybe he's not being fair, but he can't think with those guns pointed at his head.

When he gets back to the motorcade, his security detail peels off from the others and directs him to one of the SUVs he and Bucky didn't ride in on the way here. He climbs in the back and folds his arms and wonders if there is an established protocol for the security detail when the First Couple is fighting. Are they fighting? He leans his head back against the leather seats.

It's not that he's angry at Bucky, he decides as the engine starts up, or even disappointed. He feels off-balance - has felt off-balance since he woke up here. Steve has trusted his own moral compass since he was old enough to hear people cursing out his ma for being Irish and that compass has worked pretty well for him so far. He trusts Bucky's too. But, there is trusting Bucky and then there is trusting everyone, now and in the future, who will have a finger on the trigger of those helicarriers.

He groans and leans forward. He doesn't want to go back to the White House right now, doesn't want to be reminded of the weight that rests on Bucky's shoulders. “Can we just drive?” he asks finally, feeling strangely vulnerable. “I don’t…”

The SUV starts and Steve leans back against the leather seats. They drive for hours. Steve feels like he’s one large loose end, flapping desperately in the breeze and looking for something solid to grab onto, something that is tangible. He thinks briefly about visiting Sam again but his insides feel too raw.

Part of Steve wants nothing more than to crawl into their big bed and wrap himself around Bucky until he can't tell where he begins and ends. But, right now, every time he pictures Bucky, he sees those helicarriers in that cavernous space and he sees them floating high above the world, guns trained downward.

Outside the windows, D.C. rolls by and Steve stares out at the monuments and the tourists. He doesn’t know what he’s looking for - some magical sign that will show him the right answer. There is no easy solution, he thinks as day starts to dim. There never has been: not before he woke up in the future and not after. Somehow though, the decisions he made during the war felt more solid. He’d felt confident he’d made the best decision he could. Now, he’s not sure.

The easy way, he thinks, is to sit back and let this all pass by him, to shrug off his own responsibility and let things proceed as they would. But, he decides, he’s never been one for the easy way.

When they finally get back to the White House, Bucky is gone.

A staffer looks faintly apologetic. “He had a meeting in New York,” she tells him when he asks. “It’s supposed to last through dinner.”

Steve eats alone in their kitchen and thinks that fairy tales aren’t supposed to go this way.

That night, Bucky slips into bed late, trying to be quiet. When Steve rolls over to face him, Bucky’s face is drawn and sad in the dim light coming from the window.

Steve reaches out, pulls him close. "We may not always agree," he says quietly to Bucky's hair. "But, I love you, okay? Never forget that."

Bucky's arms come up and he clings back, fingers digging into Steve's shoulders. "I'm sorry. I'm just... I'm trying to do what's right and I'm sorry I sent the detail after you but I just. It gets scary sometimes. I want to protect you. I want to protect this nation and sometimes I feel like I can't do it all. That I have to choose."

Steve kisses him gently. "Just rest now, okay? Things will look better in the morning. I know it."

 

* * *

 

Steve visits Peggy two days later, with his security detail, including (happily) Natasha and (less happily) Rumlow, firmly attached. He leaves, for once, before Bucky is awake, wanting to make an early start of it. Bucky grumbles a little when he slides out of bed but Steve kisses his forehead and smoothes his hair and he settles again. They haven’t spent much time together since the helicarriers - Bucky’s been busy through their usual dinners and Steve hasn’t made the effort to go down to the offices. When they do see each other, conversations are brief and cordial. This isn’t the first time they’ve argued and Steve knows it won’t be the last, but it still makes the entire underside of his skin itch.

The retirement home is in Virginia, just a few hours from the White House. Clean white buildings are nestled in lush green hills and, out Peggy's window, Steve can see miles and miles of gardens and trees. It's a small facility, with excellent security, and all the occupants are all ex-intelligence of some sort.

Peggy's room is on the second floor with a wide window and comfortable chairs. There is a dresser full of her family photos right next to her bed. The first time he came here, just a week after waking up, it took him a couple tries to get from the doorway to her bedside. Becca had been old, but she'd still been on her feet and that light had still crackled in her eyes. Seeing Peggy like this was irrefutable proof of the terrible, inexorable slog of the decades.

He's better this time around. They stop off in the little town nearby before they arrive and he picks up a thick, bright bouquet of flowers and he doesn't hesitate in the doorway, walks right over to her, kisses her cheek and says, "hi, Pegs," like this is something he's been doing for years and years.

"I don't know," he tells her, holding her gnarled hand gently in his after they've been sitting together for a while, "how I can ever begin to repay you or thank you for watching after Bucky all these years."

She pats his hand. "He's always been a good man, my dear. Sometimes he just needed a good kick in the pants to remind himself."

"Sometimes," Steve bends his head low next to hers, "I think I know what the right thing to do is. But how he can listen to me at all after all this time? I must... The things he's seen. I must be like a child to him." He draws in a wet breath. "When do I trust him and when do I trust myself?" When he compares himself to Bucky, he feels so young and lost. Bucky is smart and competent and in charge and Steve is a relic in a flag costume.

"Steve Rogers," Peggy says, her voice fragile like dried rose petals. "You are the most dramatic man I've ever had the pleasure of knowing. That boy loves you and respects you. He's not going to kick you out over a difference in opinion. The years he spent telling people that ‘Steve Rogers wouldn't have done that.’ Forgive an old woman’s sentimentality, but you're his North Star."

“And what I'm wrong?”

Peggy meets his gaze dead on. “I don't think we would be having this conversation if you weren't sure, in your heart of hearts, that you were right. Trust your convictions, Steve. Trust that you're brave enough and smart enough to know - because you are.”

Steve ducks his head. "I want to be enough for him, Pegs. But what if I'm not?”

"You are," Peggy repeats firmly. "Steve Rogers, you will always be enough. Now, stop lamenting your own love life and let me tell you about Steven Junior."

"The one you named after me?" Steve settles back in his chair.

"That's the one - should've known better. Saddling a kid with that moniker basically made it destiny he'd be causing trouble..."

Steve settles back in his chair and lets her stories wash over him.

He's on his way back to the White House when he realizes he's not ready to face another evening of eating dinner alone, caught between desperately missing Bucky and wondering what to say. He needs a plan, a way to make Bucky understand that there’s ways besides the helicarriers to keep everyone safe.

"Something on your mind?" Natasha asks from next to him. It's night outside now, both of their faces in shadows from dim track lighting and the glare of the passing city.

He sighs. "Do you ever think you know the right thing, but then everyone is telling you something different?" The headlights of other cars speeds past them and he tries to imagine the families inside, trusting Bucky to keep them safe.

Natasha shrugs. "I'm Russian. I learned a long time ago that people lie. Trusting your own heart, that's strength."

In the darkness, he turns to look at her. "Are we friends?" he asks quietly.

She meets his gaze, steady like a rock, but something strangely vulnerable in the tilt of her neck. "Depends on what kind of friend you want, Rogers."

They're close to the same age, he realizes. "One who I can trust to have my back."

"Not many people trust me," she says, matching him for quietness. "In this world, doing what I do," she gestures to the lights of D.C. looming closer, "you're better off not trusting anyone."

The car rumbles a little as it goes over a bridge and Steve leans back against the leather seats. "I think I trust you," he says, finally. "And you can trust me."

She doesn't say anything but Steve thinks he sees her nod in the dark.

He leans forward and taps on the barricade between him and the driver. "I want to make a stop," he says, once it's been lowered. "The VA hospital."

"Are you in need of medical attention, sir?" the driver asks.

"No," Steve answers, "just want to see an old friend."

He finds Sam in his office, a stack of forms several inches deep in front of him. He has reading glasses balancing on the tip of his nose and one of those fluorescent desk lamps next to him. Steve taps on the partially open door and he looks up.

"Steve! Good to see you again." Sam stands up and stretches so hard his back cracks. "Come in - I was just finishing up some paperwork."

"I don't mean to intrude," Steve hesitates in the doorway. Sam has a family and friends and a job and clients, he realizes guiltily. Steve belongs in none of those buckets and here he is, showing up like he has some sort of monopoly on Sam's time and attention. "You must be busy. I can make an appointment."

"Steve, you've saved me from going up home eating a microwave pizza and watching Friends reruns. You're not intruding. Plus, you're a friend. I always have time for friends." Sam gestures for him to sit down on the chair in front of his desk. "If I didn't want to see you, I would've run away the second your ugly mug crashed into me."

Steve rubs his chin as he sits down. "If you're sure..."

Sam nods and motions for him to go ahead.

"Do you ever regret getting out?" Steve blurts out. "Do you ever feel like, if you don't do something and then bad thing happens, it would be your fault?”

Sam straightens the stack of paperwork on his desk. Finally, he shrugs. "I don't miss the orders," he says. "I don't miss watching my friends die. But, I can't lie, if it was a worthy cause, l would be the first one volunteering to go back into it. But if I didn't - if you didn't - nothing that happened would be your responsibility. You can do a world of good for people without putting on a uniform or picking up a gun. But, I understand being a soldier: you can't sit back and let people get hurt when you could do something about it, even if there's no blame." He leans back in his chair and steeples his fingers as he studies Steve with dark eyes. "Thinking of putting on the uniform again?"

Steve looks down. "Yes. No. I don't know. What else would I do?"

"Whatever makes you happy." Sam grins and leans forward to knock him gently on the shoulder. "Anything you want. Eleanor Roosevelt was a pretty badass First Lady when you were a little kid, right?"

"My ma loved her," Steve agrees. "We saw her in a parade once."

"Well, there you go. Or you could like train little kids in self-defense. Or what was that slogan from back in the day? 'Cap wants you to avoid the clap!' Sex Ed is always a big hit. You could, I don't know, start a shelter for rescued puppies. You could write a book. Weren't you an artist or something?"

"I did charcoal and some painting," Steve answers.

"Well - there you go. Think of all the people who need painting in their lives. You could teach art to little kiddies or start your own gallery. The world is your oyster, man.”

Steve laughs, feeling lighter than he has since he saw the helicarriers. "I'll keep that in mind. Thanks, Sam."

"Anytime. You should come on back down during business hours. Our receptionist makes a mean plate of brownies which she’ll trade for some honest later."

"Steve." Natasha's voice is sharp from down the hallway and Steve turns in his chair instantly. She's striding into the doorway, her eyes fixed on him and one hand resting at the side of her jacket where Steve knows she keeps a semi automatic.

"Nat?" he asks. "What's going on?" He feels more than heard Sam tense across from him.

She shifts a little, moving her weight on the balls of her feet like she's getting ready for a fight. "I'm not sure. Rumlow says they're picking up some chatter nearby. We want to get you back to the White House as soon as possible."

Steve turns back and shrugs helplessly at Sam. He doesn't like the new state of his life - constantly being pulled from thing to thing like a puppet. "Sorry - gotta go."

"You do what you gotta do, Cap. My offer still stands for any time you want to come by." Sam's words are genuine and Steve lets himself relax a little. He extends his hand to shake and his grip is warm and firm.

"Thanks. I really mean that, Sam. You've helped a lot." He has. There haven't been many people in the future that Steve's felt like he's been able to trust. Maybe he can extend a wedding invite to Sam or do some volunteer work at the VA hospital. He still has to pick a cause right? Maybe his would be mental health services for veterans.

“Be safe, brother,” Sam tells him and then waves them both out the door.

Steve follows Natasha out into the cool night air. He feels steadier now, like he knows what he wants to do. He’ll talk to Bucky tonight, wait up all night until he gets home if he has to. There’s a way for them to work through this. And, once they have, maybe Steve will try his hand at something that isn’t fighting. He can talk to Maria in the morning, get a list of current legislation on the Hill and some names of existing non-profits - maybe he can set up his own. The Barnes Rogers Foundation has a nice ring to it.

The three SUVs are parked in the same spot as when he went in, silent and hulking in the dim parking lot light. He can't see the security detail anywhere. Something prickles against the back of his neck. Natasha ushers him toward the middle SUV, her hand firmly around his arm. There should be security personnel waiting for him or the engines should be running or...

"Something's wrong," he whispers to her, keeping his stance casual and his face calm. "I don't..."

She shoots him a quelling look and then opens the car door, motioning for him to slide into the dark interior.

"Captain Rogers," Nick Fury says from the darkness as soon as the door has closed behind them. "You need to do exactly as I say if any of us wants to get out of here alive."

Steve freezes, mind going a mile a minute. This wasn't what he had expected. If Fury was here, it meant SHIELD and Pierce were involved - and, in Steve's newly formed opinion, that meant nothing good. "Why are you here?" he hisses, getting his bearings back. "Why should I trust you?"

Fury ignores him and checks his watch. "You have exactly 23 seconds to decide whether or not you can trust me. But I'm trying to save your life and Barnes's life _and_ this whole damn country. Think fast."

"Steve," Natasha says from his shoulder, her hands clenched in her lap. "Trust him."

He meets her eyes. She’s afraid, he realizes, and deadly serious. That overrides his mistrust of Fury and he nods. "Okay. I trust you. What do I need to do?"

In the dark, Fury smiles and pulls out a slim instrument that crackles blue electricity. "Follow my lead." He sets the head of the blue electricity to the floor of the SUV, a man sized hole appearing in the bottom. "You'll need to leave behind your shirt, your engagement ring and your phone, Rogers." He pulls a pouch of something from his pocket.

"Are those teeth?" Steve asks, feeling a little incredulous as he shrugs out of his shirt. He pauses over the ring briefly, rubs his thumb across Bucky's name. It’s just a ring, he reminds himself, not even one they had picked out for themselves. "And bloody hair?"

"It should be enough to convince them we're dead for at least a few hours," Fury says. "Ready, Natasha?"

She nods.

Fury slips out through the hole in the bottom of the SUV first, Steve right behind him. Natasha comes a moment later and they all belly crawl across the dark parking lot toward a series of hedges.

They've barely reached the bushes when Steve sees the night flash bright all around and he hears a loud bang, accompanied by a rush of heat. He glances over his shoulder and sees the middle SUV, the one he had just been in, go up in flames.

"Was that you?" he asks as they huddle in the darkness of the shrubbery.

"No, Captain Rogers," Fury responds somberly.

There are people running out of the VA now. Rumlow and three other agents are sprinting toward the middle SUV, guns drawn.

"Was it them?" Steve asks, horror mounting. His voice feels hoarse. "Did they..."

Natasha looks at him. "We had suspicions for a while," she tells him quietly. "But we picked up some chatter this morning - you were going to be out of the White House with just your detail. We knew if they were going to make a move, this would be it."

Sam is out in the parking lot too now, standing a few feet from the burning SUV with his cell phone pressed to his ear.

"They wanted me dead," Steve says, feeling a little short of breath. "And you... They're going to think I'm dead now. All of them. Even Bucky."

"It's temporary," Natasha promises. She's tied her hair back and slipped a dark hat on. "It's safer for you and for him if they think their plan is succeeding."

"I need to get word to him." Steve feels something sharp in his gut. He knows exactly how he would feel if he was the one told that Bucky had died in an explosion. It seems too cruel for words. "I need to tell him..."

"You can't." Nat grabs his shoulder, pushing a dark sweatshirt toward him. "We don't know how far up this goes. We don't know who's listening and who's involved. I'm sorry, Steve. But you can't - you'd be putting him in danger."

It hurts like a knife in his ribs but she's right. If this conspiracy goes all the way up, then Bucky is a sitting duck. The only thing keeping him safe right now is the conspirators thinking their plan has succeeded. Steve sags back against her. "You think. You think this is more than just people not liking me? You think this is..." He swallows hard.

Fury looks up from where he's been peering out of the bushes. "This is bigger than you and Barnes, Captain. We need to talk about Project Insight.”

Steve flinches at the name. “I thought that was your pet project.”

“Not anymore,” Fury says shortly, “but first, we have a problem to deal with. We need a ride out here." He casts a glance over at Steve. "The initial plan was to have the motorcade stop at a gas station and pull you out of there. This little side trip of yours to the VA threw things off."

Steve looks back toward the burning SUV. Sam is standing with his arms folded across his chest, a somber expression on his face. "I think I know someone who can help."


	6. Revelations and Preparations.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky and Steve both make plans.

_Revelations and Preparations._

 

Bucky isn’t surprised when the living quarters are empty and dark when he gets home. He hasn’t been home for dinner in days and he knows Steve was visiting Peggy today - Steve probably chose to eat dinner with her. Briefly, he considers heading back down to the office; but, tonight, he desperately wants to see Steve.

He changes out of his suit and pulls on a worn pair of jeans and a thick blue sweater that he's had since he graduated law school and took his first case. Then he settles down with a report on grain production in India and a cup of coffee and waits, curled in one of the big chairs so he can see the door. He turns on just one lamp (it's the one that Steve likes - an antique thing with an old bulb that doesn't have that fluorescent glow of most lights here) and lets the yellow light spill across the papers in his lap in a warm puddle. Whenever he glances up and his eyes catch on the matching, empty armchair just on the other side of the round side table, or Steve's shield propped by the bookcases, his stomach clenches unhappily.

It would be a drastic understatement to say that he doesn’t like fighting with Steve. Truth be told, he hadn't even liked it even when they were both snotty-nosed, scraped-kneed kids and their biggest argument was whether they should try to sneak past the fence to go sit down by the docks near the Navy Yard. He'd always got that sick feeling in his stomach and that heavy feeling in his chest, a sense of wrongness that only came when Steve was mad at him. Almost 90 years later, he feels like a kid again, stomach heavy as he waits for Steve to work off his steam so they can talk.

His ma always told him, may God rest her soul, that Steve was a firecracker - that he burned fast and hot and loud, and to just be patient and he'd come back around to Bucky's side. As he had gotten older, Steve had tamed that tendency well enough - but whenever he did get his wad up about something he thought was important, well, Bucky learned it was best to help or get out of the way.

During the war, it had been easy. Bucky had been two bricks short of a load after Azzano and Hydra and Zola, and Steve had been so righteous in his fury, like Bucky imagined an avenging angel to be. It had been what kept him on his feet during the European campaign, just hunkering down and trusting Steve to be his moral compass through the trenches. When he reviews their missions, even with hindsight, Bucky will go to his grave swearing that Steve hadn't led him wrong once.

And, then Steve had died and Bucky was left with one arm, a head full of holes, and a black pit of grief in his heart that he couldn't see the bottom of when he dared to peer over the edge. Bucky had spent years, decades, almost three quarters of a century, pulling up his own moral compass and setting it on track. It started out as "Steve would do this" and "Steve wouldn’t do that" and "Steve would pop that guy in the jaw." Then, slowly, as the years ticked on and the world changed, Bucky figured out his own way to be, dredging up not just Steve's moral code, but something of his own, built from years of trying and trying and trying. He learned to stand on his own two feet, but he'd be lying if he'd said he didn't hear Steve's whisper in his ear during the toughest times.

So, 90 years out from the streets of Brooklyn, arguing with Steve felt like arguing with the good angel on his right shoulder, the voice of his conscience that just wouldn't leave him alone. It was maddening.

He checks his watch again in the golden lamplight and makes a face. He doesn't blame Steve for dragging his feet getting home but he wishes he would hurry. Bucky grabs his tablet and pulls up the email he had sent over to Alex the night after they visited the Triskelion. Bucky is requesting that the launch of Project Insight be delayed from its original launch date of next week for a minimum of six months to allow for a complete independent audit of Project Insight's targeting algorithms and privacy controls. Alex finally had responded to the email earlier this evening, very unhappy. He seemed to understand though, at least, that an order was an order. Bucky wanted to show Steve that he was taking his concerns seriously.

When he had first taken office, Bucky had brought up the idea of an independent review when he had first seen the scale and scope of Project Insight. He had been brushed off on account of the costly time delays it would cause the project. "Ten million a day," had shrieked one congressional report, hand delivered to his desk by Alex. Now, Bucky is asking again and he will not take no for an answer. He’s the Commander in Chief. Congress and Pierce can scream at him all day - but his first responsibility is to the American people. If he is going to put a giant gun up in the air that is pointing directly at them, he is damned well better going to know who has their finger on the trigger.

He sets the tablet back down and rubs his hands over his face. He wants Steve to come home. He wants to show Steve this, see Steve’s face break with dawning pride and know that they’ll be okay. That’s when he hears a knock at the suite door. He frowns but still calls, "Come in!"

Rollins, one of his night security detail, appears and his face is dark and set, completely unreadable in the lamplight. "Mr. President, we have a situation developing. We don't believe it's an immediate risk to you - but you need to come to the situation room right away."

Bucky tucks a bookmark into the report he had been reading and slides his feet into his shoes, following him out the door. He’s used to this now. "If Steve arrives before I get back," he says as they walk down the hallway "can you have someone ask him to wait up for me?"

Rollins's face doesn't move. "Yes, sir."

The situation room is full. Alex is even there, looking like he was dragged from a quiet evening of his own in a sweatshirt and jeans. Bucky recognizes one of the liaisons from SHIELD (Jared Sitwell maybe?) and a couple of high ranking FBI officials, as well as the chief of the Secret Service. Maria is in a black cardigan and jeans, hair back in a bun, and her mouth is just a thin line. They all stand when he enters and he motions for them to be seated as Maria hands him a cup of coffee. He mentally groans, she must think he's going to be here awhile.

On the large viewing screen at the front of the room, what looks to be an SUV in a dark parking lot is burning. Behind the blaze, he can see the flashing lights of squad cars and people walking on the screen have black windbreakers that say SHIELD in white lettering on the back.

"Okay, what am I looking at?"

Glances are exchanged and postures shift around the room: everyone trying to pass the buck to someone else. His gut gnaws uncomfortably.

Finally Alex says (his voice is gentle and it's times like this that Bucky remembers that his Vice President has four grandkids), "Sir, there was an explosion a few minutes ago at the VA hospital in D.C.. We believe… we know...well, sir, it was Captain Rogers's motorcade. We have reason to believe it was a cover for an unknown element to abduct him."

Bucky ends up crushing the porcelain mug in his hand, coffee splashing down his sweater sleeve and across the oak table and then on to the floor. Behind him, he's distantly aware of people scrambling to get towels.

"Show me," he demands, even though he really doesn't want to see. He wants to crawl back in bed and wait for Steve to come home and hold him close and tell him this has all been one of his nightmares. He wants to wake up and have breakfast on the Truman Balcony and take Steve to the museum and marry him in a garden.

Pierce nods and the big viewing screen changes to a peaceful parking lot, dim streetlights and the glow of shops on the right hand side of the screen. Steve appears, coming from the direction of the VA entrance, walking quickly next to Natasha. There isn’t any audio but Bucky can see him looking around, his mouth moving as he says something to Natasha. He seems on alert but not particularly suspicious of anything. They both climb into the back of the SUV and close the door. A car drives past the street behind them. For a second, the video fast forwards as nothing moves across the screen and then slows again at 35 seconds in. A large van rolls slowly by, briefly blocking the SUV. The darkness prevents Bucky from seeing the driver.  Then the van speeds up and is gone.

Five seconds later, the SUV ignites like a dried bush hit by lightning, fire and metal shooting outward as it explodes. Car alarms go off on the surrounding vehicles and dark figures are running out of the other SUVs, the shops, and the VA. Flames are licking at the night sky and the only thing Bucky can make out through the fire is a twisted, empty frame where one of his best friends and the love of his life had been.

His lungs feel tight and he scrambles at what Pierce had just said. "But you said - abducted? Not murdered?" If Steve and Natasha have both been murdered, Bucky will use every single one of the considerable resources at his disposal to track the culprits down. There are prisons, he knows, where they will never see the sun again.

Pierce nods. "Initial forensics say that there was at least one body in the car at the time of the explosion. We believe it is the body of Natasha Romanoff." He takes a folder from Sitwell. “There hasn’t been a ransom demand but we’ve picked up encoded communications that indicate a group has successfully taken Captain Rogers, alive, and is currently trying to smuggle him out of the country. We do believe, though, that Agent Romanoff was killed in the explosion.”

Bucky bows his head, something cracks deep in his chest at the loss of Natasha, even as one part blooms with something like hope that Steve could still be alive. "Any other leads?"

"We're trying to gather security footage that will show us more about that van that drove past just before the explosion. It could be our best shot," the head of the CIA says. "We're also questioning all agents that were on detail that night, as well as witnesses from the surrounding area." He hesitates for a second and then says, "Sir, we're not ruling out that this was an inside job."

Bucky snaps his head up. "What?"

"Let's not be hasty." Pierce lays a gentle hand on his arm. "We're investigating all possibilities but I picked the men in Steve's detail personally. They're all good men with solid track records." He pauses and then leans closer. "Sir, I would like to offer a suggestion. We can have Project Insight ready to launch in just over 24 hours. Its tracking capabilities would give us resources that could help us quickly locate Steve before they can get him out of the country - much more quickly than any of our current technology. I know you just requested that audit... but times like this call for extraordinary measures, Mr. President."

The SUV continues to burn on the viewing screen. Natasha is dead. One of the people Bucky trusts most in the world, gone in an instant. He won't lose another. He can't lose another.

Bucky closes his eyes and pictures that night, weeks ago now, at the Washington Monument, Steve's hand on the small of his back as they spun in slow circles while D.C. twinkled below them. _Please_ , he thinks and opens his eyes.

"Do it," he says.

 

* * *

 

Steve pulls his hoodie low over his head and keeps his face turned down as he makes his way the last few feet to the service entrance of the VA. He'd crept from the bushes and all the way down the street, coming up to the VA from the back side. He misses his shield desperately, but he had left it behind that morning when he left to visit Peggy and he curses the decision now.

They'd waited in the bushes until Sam had gone back inside, police and firefighters cordoning off the still burning SUV and then he, Fury ("Call me 'Nick'"), and Natasha had snuck back to lie low at the back of the parking lot. Now, it was up to Steve to go bring Sam in on their plan.

Sam had stood outside in the parking lot for quite awhile after the explosion, arguing with the security detail and talking to the firefighters and paramedics who'd shown up just a few minutes later. No one else had been injured in the explosion and Steve's security detail confirmed that they'd seen him and Natasha get in the car just seconds before. Sam had looked devastated when he'd finally gone back to his office.

The hallway of the VA is quiet, the only light coming from underneath Sam's door. Steve keeps his footsteps light down the tile. He can see the orange glow of the fire out the window at the end of the hallway and hear the sounds of radios.

Someone will be telling Bucky soon, he knows, if they haven't already. He doesn't want to think about it but his mind keeps conjuring images of Bucky asleep in their bed, and the look on his face when he had walked away from Bucky in the Triskelion. The idea of Bucky, alone, finding out once again that Steve has gone and left him hurts like a knife twisting in his side.

"I'll be home soon," he promises across the distance, praying that Bucky can somehow feel him, against all odds. "Be safe. Watch your back."

Sam's door is unlocked and Steve turns the handle gently, sliding inside without a noise. Sam is sitting at his desk, head in both of his hands and one lit lamp right next to him.

"Sam," Steve whispers and the other man's head jerks up.

Sam’s entire face falls in shock. "Steve?" Sam stands up even as Steve makes hushing motions with his hands. "What the hell, man. Everyone thinks that you just were killed out there!" he says at a low hiss. In the dim light, Steve can see that Sam's eyes are red-rimmed.

Steve reaches forward, calming. "I know. I know. It's a long story."

"A long story... Steve, I was just positive that I was one of the last people to see Captain America alive on this goddamned earth and now you're standing in my office. This had better be some War and Peace level of explanation." Sam’s hands are trembling and Steve watches as he presses them against the desk to still them.

Steve grimaces. There isn’t exactly time for War and Peace. "We - I think my security detail is trying to kill me. I know that's not much of an explanation but it's what I’ve got. I need your help. If you can."

Sam sucks in a deep breath, pinches his nose, and then looks out the window at the flashing lights before he nods. His hands are steadier now. "What the hell. Of course. What do you need?"

They all slip into the back of Sam's car just as the brighter lights of more SUVs start pulling up. Steve and Natasha lie in the backseat footwell while Fury just removes his eyepatch and shoves a baseball hat on his head. It's approaching dawn by then and Steve casts a glimpse in the direction of the National Mall as Sam guides his car carefully toward the outskirts of the city, following Fury's directions. They take a circuitous route, winding through deserted streets and highways until dawn is just poking up over the trees.

"I've been suspicious for a while," Fury says, as they drive up a winding dirt road toward a reservoir on the outskirts of the city.  "Even before they defrosted you, Cap. There have been too many coincidences - too many things that didn't quite line up right, but Pierce has been a friend of mine for years. I didn't want to face the truth right in front of me. But now… Something is going wrong with Project Insight. Two days ago, they removed my access codes so I couldn’t see the final launch instructions. That’s when I knew it was serious."

"Any idea who is running the show?" Steve asks. The familiar thrum of battle is building in his gut, intertwining with the deep need to see this done so he can get back to Bucky.

"Pierce is up there. He's been the guiding force behind Project Insight since its inception - but I think there is someone else pulling the strings." Fury sighs. "The man won a Nobel Peace prize and then this. It's a wonder I'm as trusting as I am," he smiles at Natasha like they share a secret.

"And Bucky?" Steve had to clear his throat, the words barely coming out in a whisper. "Does he know about all this?"

Natasha shakes her head. "No, Steve, we've no reason to think so. James has always been skeptical of Project Insight, but he didn't feel like he had the political clout to push back against his own party."

"So what's our plan now?" Sam asks. "If you haven't noticed, we're a long way off from the Triskelion."

Fury smiles grimly. "I have someone on the inside who's going to try to send us a copy of the root program for Project Insight today. After that, we'll know more. The helicarriers are scheduled for launch next week, so we'll have time to put together a plan."

Steve meets Sam's eyes in the rear view mirror. "You don't have to do any of this," he tells him quietly. "I know you didn't sign up for this. You can just go back home and..."

"A chance to fight against bad guys with Captain America? No way I'm sitting this one out." He grins and then looks back at Natasha. "And I'm not going to be just a tag along. You ever heard of the Falcon EXO-7 project?"

 

* * *

 

While Sam and Natasha are working out how to get a pair of wings and Fury is talking to his person on the inside over a secure line, Steve finds himself sitting in front of the huge TV in the break room. The entire place is large and drafty and it reminds Steve strongly of the SSR bunkers during the war. Bucky would love this place, he thinks, a secret base with all the gadgets.

Except Bucky probably has tons of these places as president. Steve sighs. He feels like he is missing so much from the years of Bucky's life that he was under the ice. He wants to know all of it. He wants to make up for the time they lost to the ice. "When I get back," he promises softly, "when I get back, we'll make time. We'll live out of each other's pockets like when we were kids. Just, don't give up on me, Buck."

The mention of his name from the TV grabs his attention. Across the bottom of the screen, rolling words are announcing that the president is due to speak shortly regarding the explosion at the VA hospital in D.C.  He shouldn't be watching this, he knows. It's just going to make the sick feeling in his gut grow, knowing that Bucky is hurting and he can't do anything about it.

Hopefully, someone is making sure Bucky eats breakfast and showers. Hopefully, someone Is pushing a cup of coffee into his hands and telling him to sit down now and then. Steve groans and pulls his hands through his hair. This is all to keep Bucky safe. Bucky will understand when Steve explains.

On the TV, the screen changes and Bucky is standing in front of a lectern in the Rose Garden, where they are getting married in just a few weeks, Steve thinks miserably. Bucky looks like hell. He's pale and exhausted and his eyes are red. His hair looks almost deflated, a piece keeps falling over his forehead for him to brush away. There is something clenched in his fist, something he keeps rolling around in his fingers like talisman. Alexander Pierce is standing on one side of him and Maria Hill is on the other. Steve drops his head, unable to look.

"Last night," Bucky starts, and his voice is hoarse and strained like he'd screamed for hours and hours and Steve hadn't been there to hold him. "My fiancé, Captain Steve Rogers, was abducted by unknown terrorists and a member of his security detail was killed in an explosion."

Steve's head jerks up. This isn’t what is supposed to happen.

"Currently, we have the best men and women investigating this incident and ensuring that our nation is safe. With the help of Alexander Pierce and SHIELD, we are using the very latest in cutting edge technology to make sure that Ste- that Captain Rogers is returned safely. I ask for your prayers and support, and patience in this trying time as we seek to bring him home safely and bring the terrorists to justice. Secretary of Defense Thaddeus Ross will now give an update on the logistics of the search and answer any questions you may have. Thank you." Bucky nods and then walks back down the corridor to the Oval Office, ignoring the clamoring press behind him. His shoulders are hunched like he's carrying the greatest burden of his life. All Steve can do is stare after him.

"Goddamn it," he breathes. His brain is going a mile a minute, evaluating scenarios and discarding them. He swallows hard. There is only one thing Bucky could be talking about.

He pushes back from the table and takes off down the hallway at a run. "Fury!"

Natasha and Sam appear with Fury right behind them.

"Cap?"

Steve's heart is hammering in his chest and his fingers are itching for his shield. "We need to move up the timeline. They're launching Project Insight early. I don't know how they convinced Bucky, but..."

Fury is nodding. His mouth is thin. "I got a call from my guy. Sounds like their plan all along was to kill you but then tell Barnes you'd been abducted. Apparently Barnes had balked at the idea of Insight and requested a full audit and halted the launch orders for next week. They orchestrated all of this to look like an abduction so they could convince him to launch tomorrow morning."

A door bangs behind them. "Sounds like I got here just in time then." Tony Stark strides down the hallway, gray suit impeccably pressed. "Hello, Capsicle, did you miss me?" He doesn't even wait for answer, pushing past them to the main room. "You're going to want to sit down for this," he calls over his shoulder.

Steve exchanges a look with Sam. "He's your guy on the inside?" he asks Fury.

Fury shrugs. "One of them. Stark was key in the early development of Project Insight - he started getting uncomfortable with some of its programming the same time I did."

They file into the main room and Stark has already got the computer screens all lit up. The room looks dank, but in the green light of the monitors, suddenly it looks like one of the alien planets from Bucky's sci fi novels.

"First!" Tony says with a clap of his hands. "I brought presents. Cap." He reaches into the bag he's been toting and pulls out a familiar round carrier. "I believe you forgot something during your dramatic exit."

Steve takes the black nylon gratefully and pulls out the shield. He touches his fingers to the white star. "How'd you get it?"

Stark taps his fingers to his lips. "Nope. A gentleman never kisses and tells." He reaches into the bag again. "And a little birdie told me we had a friend joining us... Or maybe it was that we had a little birdie joining us."  From the bag, a metallic pack emerges and Sam instantly lights up.

"My wings!" He reaches for them, pulling them close like a beloved toy.

"Yeah, well, if you can call them that," Stark says. "Honestly, these are the scientific version of a pigeon's flappers. Give me longer than three hours and we'll get you something that makes a pterodactyl look like a wind up toy. I'll need to talk to Rhodey about the shoddy equipment the Air Force is..."

"Stark. You've had your show, now get to the point," Fury growls, glaring across the table.

"Right. So. I did a little investigating, pulled some strings and found this," Stark brings something up on the main screen.

It takes a second for the green dots to coalesce into a pudgy face and glasses. The sight bowls Steve over for a second - he'd never expected to see that face again. The last time had been when the scientist was being dragged off to an interrogation room at an Italian base – Steve had been pretty distracted by Bucky shaking to pieces from blood loss from his torn off arm.

"That's Armin Zola," Steve says out loud. He's proud that his voice doesn't shake at all. "He was the Hydra scientist who experimented on Bucky in Azzano. The mission to capture him... That's when Bucky lost his arm. What's he got to do with Project Insight?" The face stirs up memories of Bucky screaming himself hoarse from nightmares.

Tony taps the desk like he's a professor. "Zola was a part of Operation Paperclip, Nazi scientists given amnesty in exchange for working to advance science in the US. He joined SHIELD officially in the 1960s. He was obsessed with the idea of eugenics - he thought, given enough information, he could predict everyone's future from the moment they were born. He wrote programs that helped decide which schools got funding, which communities got a rec center or a sports program, or even which kids got scholarships. But, Project Insight - that was something else. On the surface, Zola was a good little reformed Nazi, living happily in democratic America. But, in reality, Zola was plotting the resurrection of Hydra ever since you crashed that plane, Steve. Zola wrote Project Insight as the program that he believed would bring about Hydra's rule. He developed an algorithm that would predict anyone who could pose a threat to Hydra, now or in the future. Zola died almost fifteen years ago - but the current disciples of the scary Nazi cult have loaded that algorithm the targeting system of Project Insight."

"Hydra," Steve repeats. He closes his eyes and sees Red Skull screaming in the belly of a plane while a blue light swallows him whole. "I thought... I thought they were all gone."

Tony looks a little sympathetic. "Looks like they just found some place else to hide. The more I dig, the more I find their slimy tentacles through every part of SHIELD. They’re like an anthill. Or cockroaches. I'm pretty sure Pierce is Hydra. I don't know how many others. But it's safe to say that SHIELD, if not the entire U.S. Government, has been thoroughly compromised."

Natasha is staring at the computer screen. "So when the helicarriers go up..."

"Twenty million people die," Tony says. "I'm on the list. As are you, Nick and Nat. Steve, you're not - but I'm guessing it's because you woke up so recently. Even new guy over here, Sam Wilson, is on it."

"And Bucky?" Steve asks, feeling suddenly cold. He doesn't know which answer he’d prefer. If he's not on the list, it means he's safe if they can't manage to stop the launch. If he's _not_ on the list, that means Hydra doesn't view him as a threat.

Tony nods. He takes his glasses off and rubs his eyes. He looks older to Steve now, slumped and weary. "He's on there - along with Rhodey and Pepper, Peggy Carter, Bruce Banner, Maria Hill. All of them are dead unless we stop this before tomorrow morning."

Steve closes his eyes. He’s out of options. Bucky had already escaped death by Zola's hands once. It may be a whole new century, but Steve is still the man who marched into Italy against orders to pull Bucky Barnes from the clutches of Hydra. He would do it again.

"I suppose this isn't going to be as simple as cutting the helicarrier fuel lines," Sam says. "Jamming a stick in their motor? Pouring sugar into their gas tank? No?" He's bouncing on his toes, nervous energy bleeding out. Steve knows that, unlike himself, Sam hadn't planned on throwing in his lot to undermine a government conspiracy this morning. Steve had chosen this life from the moment he'd learned about Pearl Harbor - but, nonetheless, here Sam was, making plans.

"Well, since I built them, they're a little harder to disable than that. But, also I built them, so they have a backdoor. We just have to," Tony snaps his fingers together, "get it open. Thankfully, I've been picking locks since my dad started locking his liquor cabinet."

"Once we regain control of Project Insight," Fury says, "we'll be able to root Hydra out of SHIELD and..."

"No." Steve stands up. There has been a lot in this new century that he's been unsure about how to approach - but this he knows. "We do this, we need to burn it all. SHIELD and Hydra. It all needs to go. Sometimes the only way to save something is to rebuild it from the ashes."

Fury looks down. "I didn't know about Zola," he says quietly. For the first time, Steve thinks he hears regret.

"I know," he replies, just as quiet. He can't stop seeing Bucky on that table or remembering Zola's smug face as he saw Bucky dying in Steve’s grip as the other Commandos had hustled him from the train. "But there's nothing worth saving, Nick."

“He’s right,” Natasha says softly and Sam nods.

Tony breaks the silence, clapping his hands together. He reminds Steve so much of Howard in that moment that he feels like he's seeing double. "Well, now that we have our end game, let's talk logistics. If we're gonna fight a war, we're gonna need uniforms."

Natasha rolls her eyes. “Oh, please,” she says but she sounds fond.

“Cap,” Tony says grandly and hands over a swath of blue fabric. “This isn’t your standard parade outfit. Durable, waterproof with some body armor – won’t stand up to armor piercing rounds, but best I could do with the accelerated timeline. Falcon, I have something that will help with air drag. Nat, I figured you would kill me if I made something new, so I just brought you that black number you favor.”

“You’re a wise man, Stark,” Natasha tells him, taking the black fabric he hands her.

"Aww," Tony says, taking a step back and looks at all of them, once they're all outfitted in the gear he brought a couple hours later. "We need a group shot. Nick, can you take a photo? Remember that whole Avengers Initiative thing you threw out because we were all unstable and losers? Look at us now."

Nick rolls his eye - but he takes the photo.

 


	7. A time for action.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Out of the frying pan and into the fire.

_A time for action._

 

It’s still dark when Bucky leaves the White House in his motorcade, bound for the Triskelion the morning of the launch. At the gates, they drive through a throng of reporters with flashing cameras and shouted questions that echo inside the tinted, bulletproof windows. He stares ahead at nothing and doesn’t answer them, pretends he can’t hear.

Ahead of him, there’s a small TV playing CNN on mute. Steve’s picture is up over the anchor’s head and the headlines are scrolling below. It’s nothing he doesn’t already know. There’s been no confirmation or contact from the terrorists. Steve is still missing. His own words, hoping for Steve’s safe return. Bucky looks away.

Maria is sitting in the seat facing him and, as they’re about to turn down the street, she gestures out the window. “You’ll want to see this, sir.”

Bucky looks and sees that the gates of the White House have been decorated. There are flags and teddy bears and greeting cards and half burned candles. A few people are waving as they drive past. A picture of Steve has been taped to the gates.

“They all want him home too,” Maria says quietly. Bucky hears her shift on the seats. “He’ll be okay, sir,” she tells him. “He’s strong, like you.”

He knows he should thank her for the kind words, but Bucky finds he can’t speak around the thick lump in his throat. He hasn’t slept, has barely closed his eyes, since he watched Steve’s SUV explode on the viewing screen and he knows it shows. There are dark circles under his eyes and his jaw is rough with stubble.

Right after they had told him, he had tried to go back to the residence to grab a change of clothes - but had only made it as far as the doorway of their bedroom. Steve’s running shoes from that morning had been lined up neatly next to the door frame and he’d felt his entire body go cold all over. Since then, he’s been showering down at the Oval Office and sending staff up for fresh clothes.

Today, he’s wearing his suit like an armor, everything pulled and polished in a tight facade that’s not doing much to help his cracking inside.

Natasha has been dead and Steve has been gone for almost 24 hours. Bucky had lived an entire lifetime without him - and now, 24 hours after losing him again, Bucky is feeling unmoored. He makes a fist and lets his engagement band dig into his fingers. This little piece sometimes feels like the only hard evidence that Steve had come back to him at all.

Bucky keeps remembering when Tony had been taken out in the desert, years ago now. Back then, Bucky had been helpless and scared and so, so angry as lead after lead had turned up nothing. They'd told him it was hopeless, that there was nowhere left to search, and that Tony was probably dead. He'd gone over to Afghanistan himself, twice, scouring the desert and looking for a needle in the haystack. It had been Rhodes who had finally found him: Tony had saved himself. Bucky isn't helpless anymore - he can make them keep looking until they find Steve. There won't be any giving up this time. And, if nothing else, Bucky is confident in Steve's ability to look Death in the face and spit in its eye.

Realistically, Bucky knows that time is running out. Not even Steve could hold out forever. They have to find him soon or it will be too late. The intelligence turned up in the last 24 hours has been dismal - Project Insight is their best bet. Really, the only new thing Bucky learned is that Fury was also in the SUV when it exploded. Another trusted colleague down.

"I can't do it again," he'd told Tony last night in the Oval Office. Tony had brought a decanter of whiskey and two glasses and had plopped himself down on one of the couches. Bucky sat across him and let the whiskey burn his throat. "I can't lose him when I just got him back. And Natasha, Fury... I'm not... Am I doing the right thing?"

He never liked Project Insight. Steve's reaction upon seeing the hangar had only cemented the feeling and he wishes more than anything that he had requested that audit sooner. Something in Bucky’s gut was telling him that this was all fishy. Why had Fury been in that car with Steve and Natasha? Steve had been visiting Peggy - there would have been no reason for the Director of SHIELD to show up. There were more questions than answers. But now, with Steve gone and with no leads, Alex was right. This was the best possible chance at getting Steve back in one piece. He could deal with the rest of it once Steve was back by his side. Helicarriers that went up could come down, right?

Last night, Stark had no answers and Bucky isn't finding any additional clarity in the sunlight. He misses Natasha's cool and collected presence like a gaping wound.

They arrive at the Triskelion just after sunrise, pulling in past another group of reporters at the security gates. Project Insight will launch in less than three hours. Bucky pauses briefly when he steps out of the limo. There’s a breeze kicking up off the Potomac and the sky is still streaked with pink.

_I'm coming for you,_ he thinks, reaching up so his engagement band clacks against the dog tags and Steve's engagement ring. _Just hold on._

One of the agents had brought him Steve's engagement ring last night, delivered in a plain white envelope. They told him it had been pulled from the SUV. Bucky cupped it in his palm long after they left, running his fingers over the smooth curve. He'd imagined Steve slipping it off as they pulled him the car, a promise to Bucky that he'd come back.

“Sir?” one of his agents steps up on his left. “We should move inside.”

He nods and lets them herd him into the building. Despite the early hour, the lobby of the Triskelion is bustling like it’s midday. The employees part like water around Bucky’s detail, but he can see all the pitying glances directed at him. How many of them, he wonders, already believe Steve to be dead?

"Mr. President?" Bucky turns and finds Maria there, holding her tablet like always. She looks much better than him, not a hair out of place, but there is something nervous in her stance that puts him on edge as well.

"Yes?" He pulls his shoulders back, tries to summon that feeling he used to get when he knew Steve was relying on him. Inside his pocket, hidden from sight, he gently runs his fingers over the picture of Steve.

"Vice President Pierce sends his apologies, he'll be along as soon as possible." She looks down. "The World Security Council has convened upstairs on the fiftieth floor, if you would like to join them."

"Thanks, Maria. But I…” he clears his throat. “Where’s the launch room? I want to see it first.” In his heart, he thinks he'll always be a sergeant, more comfortable with being in the nitty gritty of action than sitting on an ivory tower. Steve was always better at inspiring people to follow - Bucky was more comfortable putting his nose to the grindstone.

She frowns but nods. “Thirty-fifth floor, sir. I can escort you.”

“Thanks,” he starts following her and then pauses when he realizes his security detail is right behind him. “You guys stay down here,” he tells them. “I’m going into secured areas. You can get much safer than this.”

Rollins frowns. “Sir, given the abduction…”

“I’ll be fine.” Bucky makes his voice sharp. “Look, we all know that I’m more than capable of protecting myself and I let you all follow me around because it makes everyone feel better. But, today, I need to be alone with my thoughts and I need you to wait in the lobby. That’s an order. Alright?”

“Yes, Mr. President.” Rollins looks very unhappy, but there’s not much he can do.

In the elevator, Maria gives him a long look but doesn’t say anything. “They won’t be happy you did that,” she says at last as the elevator dings upward. “Someone will be in my office yelling about it soon.”

“Sorry about that,” he says, knowing he doesn’t sound sorry at all.

She gives him a tiny smile. “After you see the launch room, I’ll take you up to the VIP area. Then I want to check in on the main control room and make sure the link to the White House is secure.”

Bucky shakes his head. “Thank you, Maria, but I… I want to stay in the launch room until after the helicarriers go up. I can join the Council after. They’ll understand.”

“Yes, sir,” she says blandly. The elevator doors open and they step out on the thirty-fifth floor. “The Vice President won’t like that you’ve chosen to be here instead of upstairs either,” she tells him. “He was very specific about that.”

“Maria, you know that I need to see. Pierce has gotten his launch - he can at least give me this.” If Bucky is being honest with himself, he doesn’t feel like being around Pierce or the World Security Council. He doesn’t like Pierce on good days, much less days like this.

Maria goes ahead of him through the door into the launch room, stepping back to allow him to stand next to her in the entrance way. It’s a smaller room than he had imagined. Just two rows of computer terminals, about three deep. Even at this early hour, all the computer stations are full, six SHIELD techs hunched over, staring at their screens steadfastly. None of them even look up when Bucky and Maria come into the room. Beyond them, wide windows overlook the rising sun and the blue of the Potomac, where he knows the bay doors to the helicarriers reside. At the front of the room, there’s a wide screen showing the helicarrier bay and a series of technical specifications on the right side of the screen: countdown to launch, fuel level, engine heat, speed, elevation. Near the back, there’s an empty station and Bucky heads for it. A couple of the techs have noticed him by now and he can see them exchanging looks. He tries to smile and look inconspicuous.

“I’ll be okay here,’ he tells Maria. “You go on. Go check on the control room like you wanted.”

She hesitates, fidgets from foot to foot. “Be safe, sir,” she says quietly. “Don’t do… don’t do anything stupid.”

“You sound like Steve,” he says, trying for a smile. “Nothing’s going to happen to me here, Maria. I swear.”

“Yes, sir.” She doesn’t seem convinced but she leaves quietly.

Bucky sits back in the desk chair and stares at the screens, doing his best to zone out as he listens to the quiet chatter of the busy techs. Christ, most of them are young enough to be his grandchildren. These are the people he’s counting on to find Steve.

He tries his best to distract himself by thinking about the future. The wedding is so close. It'll be big - Bucky's got no choice in that - but he's been dreaming about the moment at the altar when Steve is just a heartbeat away and the entire world is watching and Bucky say his vows and become his, forever and always. He imagines that Peggy there in the front row with Becca and Tony. Steve will wear his dress uniform and Bucky will wear a white tux and there will be rose petals. Later, years later when Bucky's no longer president, they'll buy a little house in New York, maybe somewhere in Brooklyn again. They'll have a dog and maybe adopt a kid or two and Steve will smile like he's left all of the shadows behind.

"Attention all SHIELD agents, this is Steve Rogers."

Bucky's very first thought is that it has to be some sort of trick, but he would know Steve's voice anywhere. Bucky staggers upright, staring out the window like Steve will appear from the clouds, and then spins to face the SHIELD tech closest to him. "Where is that coming from?"

The kid is still at his computer terminal but he looks just as shocked as Bucky feels. "I don't..."

Steve’s voice cuts over the top. "By now you've probably heard that I've been taken captive or murdered by enemies of the United States - enemies that would like nothing more than to tear our nation apart. You probably think you're doing your patriotic duty by launching Project Insight ahead of schedule today and I don't doubt that many of you are truly patriots."

Steve takes a deep breath over the speakers and he sounds so calm. Bucky imagines he must be the only one who can hear the tiny tremor in his voice. He heard it in alleyways when Steve was tilting back his head to stare someone much bigger in the eye. He heard it in a Hydra factory with burning beams crashing around them. He heard it again and again in that goddamn recording as Steve had pointed the nose of the Valkyrie toward ice.

"But we've all been betrayed. Two nights ago, the secret service agents who were sworn to protect me tried to blow up my car with me inside, and they weren't acting alone. SHIELD and the U.S. Government have been infiltrated by Hydra. Alexander Pierce is their leader. I don't know how many people are working with them. It could be the person right next to you. And they've almost won - Project Insight is their checkmate. If those helicarriers launch, millions of people will die. We have this one chance to stop them. Bucky... President Barnes is counting on us. If we get this done, I know he'll make sure every single member of Hydra faces trial for treason, but he can't do this alone. I know I'm asking a lot, but the price of freedom has always been high and it's a price I'm willing to pay. I'm betting I'm not the only one."

All of the kids in the room are looking back at him and Bucky realizes he's crying. He rubs his eyes hard. His captain has just given him his first order in almost 70 years. Steve is alive and well and fighting the good fight.

"Well, you heard the Captain," he says, sounding like it is an early morning march across enemy territory. "Stop the countdown. Do not launch Project Insight."

Even as the techs reach for their keyboards, the door bursts open and Bucky vaguely recognizes two members of the elite SHIELD Strike team and one member of his own personal security detail as they come bursting through the doorway, guns already up. For a moment, he feels relief. Maybe they're there to make sure Project Insight doesn’t launch? But that thought dies as Rollins (his Rollins, who came into his bedroom just hours ago and told him Steve was gone) strides up to the tech at the front of the room.

"You! Skip the countdown. Get Project Insight in the air now!" Rollins is holding a semi automatic in his hands and he points it directly at the kid's head. The kid is shaking all over, hands wavering in the air.

They didn't know he was here, Bucky realizes. They didn't expect... Well he can use that to his advantage. He slides to the floor behind the desk he had commandeered and shrugs out of the sports coat that had been put out for him that morning. He just has to get his hands on one gun - he may wear suits to work now, but he still goes to the range and the gym whenever he can.

Keeping his head down, he slides around the side of the desk and moves to a crouch. He can hear the kid crying softly. _For Steve_ , he thinks, and lunges at the nearest guy's legs. He kicks out and the operative goes down like a load of bricks. The gun bangs against the desk and Bucky grabs it with his flesh hand even as he grabs the guy by the neck with his metal hand. He squeezes hard, feels him slump limply, and then throws the guy as hard as he can at the second man. They both go down hard and don't move.

"Put the gun down," Bucky says to Rollins, bringing the muzzle around to center on his forehead. The weapon feels natural in his hand. "And, you, cancel the launch sequence."

The kid is shivering so hard his teeth are almost chattering but Rollins isn't flinching, even with Bucky’s gun in his face. All of the other techs are on the floor now, crouching under their desks. Rollins is bigger than Bucky, with arms the size of his head. "I don't think so," he says. "Launch the helicarriers, kid, or your brains go all over."

"Don't make me kill you," Bucky takes one cautious step forward on the balls of his feet.  He can see Rollins's finger tightening against the trigger, just as the kid suddenly shoves his chair backward, crashing into the armed Hydra agent. Rollins’s gun discharges into the ceiling, bringing down plaster and dust and making Rollins look up for just a second. Bucky takes the opening and pulls his own trigger twice. Rollins jerks, gun dropping from his his hands, before sprawling backward over the desk among the computer equipment. Red runs down the desk to drip beneath him.

"Sorry," the kid gasps, staring at where Rollins is lying. He's got both arms wrapped around himself but his shaking has calmed a little. "Captain's orders." Blood is splattered across the front of his glasses but when he looks up at Bucky, he's smiling a little. "Thanks, Mr. President."

"Initiating launch now," a computerized voice says suddenly and both Bucky and the kid spin to face the main screen. The launch has started. Outside of the room, a siren starts blaring like someone pulled the fire alarm.

"Hail Hydra!" screams one of the techs from behind them and they both turn just in time to see her pull the trigger of the gun she has pointed at her temple. She slumps across the terminal in front of her, gun dropping to the floor.

Bucky feels something sick turn over. She's so young and she's Hydra and now her brains are spread across the floor.  He shakes himself, there isn’t any time for that. "Can you stop it?" he asks, turning back to the kid in front of him. All of the other techs are still cowering on the ground and the screen shows only 88 seconds remaining. "We need..."

The kid is shaking his head. His eyes are huge behind his glasses. "Once the launch is in progress, we can't stop it from here. The main control room can if they have the right codes but you'll never make it in time."

"Well," Bucky says. He tucks the semi he took off the Hydra agent in his belt and he heads for the door. "At least I can try."

It's chaos outside the launch room. Most of the people who work for SHIELD are paper pushers who show up to their desks in their cubicles every day and none of them are prepared for this. There are boxes of paper scattered everywhere, people crouched behind potted plants and desks, smoke coming up from a hard drive someone had shot in the hallway (on purpose or accidentally, Bucky has no idea).

"You all need to evacuate," Bucky shouts over the noise. "Go to the ground floor and wait outside. Someone will be coming to help you." God, he hopes someone is coming to help them. He feels like he should call someone - but who? Who can he trust right now? His Vice President is Hydra. What does that mean for his staff or his cabinet? Or the Joint Chiefs? Goddamn, if he makes it out of this mess today, he's going to have a hell of a job trying to clean up the Capitol after all of this. But, right now, that is the absolute least of his worries.

He turns back to the kid tech agent who had followed him out into the hallway. "What floor is the Control Room?"

"Forty-first." The kid is as pale as milk.

Bucky shoots a look at the disabled elevators. They're on 35th floor. Well, he hadn't had time for cardio this morning. "Listen, kid, I want you to get out of the building and direct any military personnel up to the control room and the VIP area. Tell them to arrest Alexander Pierce. Tell them I'm up in the control room trying stop the launch." He steps back into the launch room long enough to pick up another two weapons from one of the downed Hydra agents.

"But how do I know if they're the good guys?"

"If they start shooting at you, they're bad." Bucky checks the clips on the new semi-automatics. Fully loaded. "Good luck, kid," he says, and offers him one of the guns before he takes off up the stairs. His shoes are definitely not made for this.

The stairwell is surprisingly clear. At each floor landing, there are sounds of shouting and alarms blaring and small explosions behind the metal door, but there isn’t any time to stop. He takes the last flight three steps at a time and finds the door to the control room locked. He pauses - it's a reinforced steel with electronic lock which means... Bucky shoves the semi into his belt with the other one and punches the door with his metal fist right above the handle as hard as he can. A shower of sparks rains down and he grabs a fistful of wires and yanks. Something sizzles inside the door and lock clicks open.

He gets his gun up as the door swings open and someone is waiting just on the other side, gun also drawn.

"Maria?" Not her too, he thinks, a little choked. He never has liked Pierce - but Maria has been with him since his first term as governor. He keeps his gun steady, though. He's a solider first. Behind her, he can see that all of the seats are empty, terminals flashing "alert" across black screens. Chairs are overturned and a couple terminals are on their side, monitors smashed and keyboards on the ground. The intercom is sparking fuzzily.

"Mr. President?" She blinks and the gun wavers downward. Bucky can see her throat work in a swallow and then she sets the gun down on the table between them and lifts her hands like she’s surrendering. "I'm trying to stop the launch."

Bucky knocks the gun off the table with one hand while keeping his steady and studies her. "So am I. You're not Hydra?" He wants to believe her so bad. She's been his friend and confidante for years.

"No, sir." She swallows and clears her throat, steadying herself. "Nick Fury... He suspected something was up too. We've been trying to figure it out."

"Okay. Okay." He picks up her gun and adds it to his collection. "I'll keep this, but I believe you. What do you need me to do?"

The countdown clock is at 18 seconds. She shakes her head. "I've tried... We've tried everything from this end. Stark is trying to hack the mainframe, but, we've moved onto Plan B. They're trying to replace the targeting systems on board the helicarriers."

"They?"

"Stark, a guy named Sam Wilson, and," she hesitates like he won't like the final name - so he already has braced himself when she says, "and Captain Rogers."

"Goddamn it, Steve," he says fervently. Of course the stubborn asshole had decided to throw himself into another Hydra war machine bound for destruction. "He better not crash this one into the goddamn ice."

"Beginning launch," the computer intones.

"Hill, I'm taking off the roof toward alpha carrier," Stark's voice comes over the comms. "Falcon and Rogers are still on the ground, taking some fire."

Bucky can see an empty turret on the far side of the control room. At the edge, he can just see a rifle propped up on its scope. "I got this," he says. Steve isn't going to be doing this alone.

He pulls off his button down shirt so he's just in his black undershirt and starts toward it. Bucky sprints up the last couple steps and gets himself situated behind the gun. Below, he can see the Potomac splitting down the middle, water churning as the helicarriers begin lifting from their hangars. He puts his eye to the scope and swings it toward the airfield. On the tarmac, little figures are scurrying to and fro and there are already fires burning near the control tower. A couple planes are already on their sides and he can see people using them for cover. There isn’t an easy way to tell who's Hydra and who's... He sees a flash and recognizes a familiar shield, bouncing across Steve's back as he runs toward the planes.

Okay. This, he can do. He finds the next guy aiming at Steve and centers his crosshairs. This rifle is one of the newest ones, all electronic, and he growls once at the data streams spitting across the screen of the scope. He misses the clean view of his old rifle and the silence of a sniper's nest, but this is similar enough in the one way that really matters. Steve is right below him. Steve needs him. He breathes in and pulls the trigger, the twenty-first century landscape turning briefly into Europe below him, and he feels something loosen. It's like coming home.

He picks off the next Hydra agent, watches the dark figure crumple onto the gray cement. "Maria, tell Steve that they have a clear route to the quinjets on the south side of the hangar."

"They're, uh, not heading for the planes." She sounds faintly apologetic.

"Then what..."

The shape of Steve and another figure suddenly join up and then wings are spreading out and they're flying above the ground, shooting toward the ascending helicarriers.

"What the hell. Does that guy have wings?"

"Well, he goes by Falcon," Maria says drily.

"Jesus, he better not drop Steve or I'll pluck those things right off." An artillery gun starts up, white puffs of smoke going up as it aims toward Steve and the birdman. Bucky pulls his gun around and puts the gunner in his sights. He inhales gently and squeezes the trigger. The artillery gun goes quiet.

The helicarriers are almost level with his nest now; he can practically see the crews running back and forth across the decks. A streak of red and gold comes flying around one corner and Tony comes screaming into view, heading for the underside of the highest carrier. He blasts twice against the glass and it shatters around him as he dives inside the underbelly. Bucky loses sight of him. He can still see the whirl of Steve and Falcon, a streak of blue as Steve is dropped onto the surface of the third helicarrier while Sam flies toward the second.

"Maria, what's the plan?" The safety snaps back in place beneath his fingers and he abandons the post to go back down the stairs, taking the earpiece she hands him and slipping it in his ear.

"To replace the targeting systems, they have to access the engine room on the helicarriers. Those will be on level 3, near the middle. Once the targeting chips have been replaced, we can choose the targets from here. The plan is to have them turn their guns on each other. We don't have anything else big enough to take them out."

"And Pierce?"

"Natasha..."

Bucky jerks to look at her. "Natasha's alive? Jesus."

Maria smiles. "Yes, sir. Fury is alive too. She snuck into the VIP area, where you were supposed to be, sir." She adds the last part pointedly. "She and Fury are making sure Hydra can't cover this up." Her eyes go down and she thumbs the comms switch twice, delaying. "They're dumping all of the SHIELD servers onto the Internet."

"That's classified information! What the hell is she thinking? They'll revoke her asylum!" He's already trying to figure out how he can protect her in front of Congress.

Maria smiles.  "It's like the Captain said, sir. Sometimes the price of freedom is high. Hydra has fully infiltrated SHIELD. The only way to be sure we got them all is to salt and burn the ashes." An alarm blares from one of the computers and she turns to check it, and then leans over the comms. "Guys, we got three minutes until the targeting system is fully online."

"I have alpha ship locked right... Now." Stark sounds smug even over the comms. The alpha ship flashes yellow on the control board. "Hill, you got it?"

Maria types quickly and a scrolling list of names appears. "Yep - got a list of all targets for alpha ship. I'm reorienting the targeting system now."

Bucky leans over her shoulder and stares at the list of names filling up the monitor. There are hundreds, even thousands, scrolling by, and most of them he doesn't recognize. "Who are these people?"  The sheer magnitude of the list is making his stomach twist. What had they been planning on doing? His eye catches on a couple of addresses: Dubuque, Encino, Olympia. These aren't high profile political targets.

"They were identified by a Hydra algorithm as people who could potentially threaten Hydra now or in the future. They were taking out all their enemies in one fell swoop." Maria hits a couple keys and the list disappears, replaced by a single target: the beta ship. "Okay, Stark, I got it. Now get out of there.  Go pick up Nick and Natasha."

"Yes, ma'am. I love it when you get all bossy." There is another spray of glass and Stark comes tumbling out of the helicarrier, zooming toward the upper floors of the Triskelion.

"This is Falcon, I have beta ship on lock down. Standing by to pick up Steve."

"Got it, Falcon. I have beta ship targeting system replaced." Maria turns. "Sir, you should really go get picked up by Stark too."

"Nope - I'm staying here until Steve is off that damned ship." Bucky folds his arms. He knows he looks more petulant child than president right now - but he learned being stubborn from the best.

She shakes her head at him and then turns back to the comms. "Captain Rogers, what's your status?"

A crackle bursts from the speaker and then Steve's voice comes through, loud and clear. "Give me a minute. Getting a little bit of pushback here."

Maria eyes the clock. "You have 110 seconds."

Bucky cringes a little as the gunfire sprays from the comms, followed by short explosions. He looks out the window and sees fire streaking along the underbelly of the charlie ship. He presses his earpiece to talk. "Steve, what the hell is going on?"

There's a pause and then a breathless, "Buck?"

It sounds just like when they were 16 and Bucky was hauling Steve up by the back of his collar after a fight with a much bigger guy. He leans forward. "Yeah, Steve, it's me. You think I'd let you have all the fun without me?"

Something loud bangs right near Steve and the microphone fuzzes out for a second. Steve is back in a moment, panting. "You should be in a bunker somewhere," he says.

"Yeah, well, my fiancé got kidnapped and I was kind of desperate to get him back." Bucky clears his throat. "You get out of there safe, okay? I'm not gonna be the one to explain to America why we're not getting married." The fear of the last few hours surges like a wave and he tamps it down.

He hears another crash and then Steve curses loudly. "We have a problem."

Bucky darts his eyes toward the clock. Sixty five seconds left. "What?"

"The disc isn't taking. I'm gonna have to try something else. Hang on. I have ti try something else." Gunfire explodes again and Steve makes a grunting noise that makes Bucky sit up straight.

"Steve!  Steve? Are you hit?" He’s clenching the table so hard that his metal fingers leave dents in the frame.

"No... No. I'm okay." Steve's breathing in short gasps and his voice is tight. He's lying. Bucky knows it to his bones. But he also knows there nothing he can do right now.

He gentles his voice. "Okay, sweetheart. Okay. Just get this in there and then Falcon will come get you and I'll make you some of that soup you love and we'll go see the Met again when you're feeling better."

Steve is quiet for another second and Bucky hears something clack in place over the speaker. "Maria, did you get that on your screen?" He sounds funny, something sharp and broken.

Bucky leans over the console. Steve hadn't been able to get the targeting system to Maria's desk but it's something else, it's... He cocks his head and then realizes. "No. No. That is not an option."

"It's the only way. I'm taking fire from Hydra on all sides - no way I can fight my way up to the control room and stop them before they're ready. This thing locks on and it's all over. But if you overheat the core, the engines fail and the targeting system won't function and the guns will misfire."

"He's not wrong," Stark offers.

"And that whole helicarrier turns into a blazing ball of glory in 15 seconds," Bucky snaps back. "You can't." He's not going to lose Steve again. He's not. It wasn't an option the first time and it's definitely not an option now.

"Buck," Steve sounds so gentle. "I'm gonna run like hell to get out of here in time, I swear. I'm gonna do my very best not to go down. I don't want to leave you again. But you know that this is the only way. Maria, you need do it now."

Maria looks at him and Bucky knows he could order her to stay her hand and she would. He is her president. He has the final say. He can choose to save Steve and condemn the millions of people on that list. Bucky closes his eyes. "Do it," he whispers, and then louder, “Do it."

Alarms blare from the other side of the comms and he hears explosions start. Bucky goes to the window, watching as the helicarriers start firing on each other. The charlie ship is silent, but only for a moment. A great ball of flame blooms out of the middle of the ship that Steve is on and rumbles outward. It's the lowest of the helicarriers and Bucky can see trees on the ground bend back from the force of the blast.

"Steve?" Maria is hunched over the microphone.

"I'm running," Steve pants back. "Sam?"

"I'm here - give me a signal and I'll come grab... Oh shit." Sam’s words cut off and Bucky hears a screeching bang, like tearing metal. "Maria, you need to get out of there - alpha ship is headed right for the Triskelion."

Bucky whips his head around and sees the first ship listing off to one side, huge flaming metal lurching across the river toward where he's standing.  "Fuck," he says wholeheartedly. "Stark! Can you pick us up?"

"That's a negative. My suit took fire when I was pulling out Romanoff and Eyepatch, here.  We're all safe, but I can't fly. I can contact the tower and get them to evacuate anyone who isn't already out."

"Sam," Steve says, "go pick them up."

"As soon as I grab you, Cap."

"Negative. Go now. I won't make it in time."

"Cap..."

"Pretty sure," Steve gasps and he sounds out of breath and in pain. "Pretty sure he's the POTUS so you have to. Do it, Sam! That's an order."

"Steve," Bucky says over Sam's curses. He can't take his eyes off of the burning helicarrier.

"Don't worry, Buck," Steve says. "I'm gonna jump into the river. It's not that high up. I've survived worse. This time, you’ll even know where I'm crashing." Something fuzzy is in his tone and Bucky knows he's not telling him everything. "I'll see you soon, Buck."

Glass shatters to his left and suddenly the man with the wings is standing in the middle of the control room. "You guys coming?"

Bucky grabs Maria and then wraps his metal arm around Sam. The ground lurches and suddenly they're all airborne, swooping under as the alpha ship plows into the side of the Triskelion a few floors above them. Glass sprays outward and Bucky feels some of them knick his face. He can't tell if the explosions he's hearing are here or over the speaker. "Okay, Steve, he's got us. You hear that? We're safe. Sam's gonna drop us off and come back to pull you out of the water."

There is no response; just pops and crackles coming over the speaker.

"Steve? Steve! Answer me."

"Yeah - yeah. I'm here, Buck. I'm right here."

Giant flaming metal pieces of debris are raining from the helicarriers and crashing into the river below. The banks are already littered with twisted helicarrier parts. Directly below them, Bucky can see panicked crowds scattering in the courtyard of the Triskelion as pieces of building start falling like meteors. He closes his eyes for a second as Sam swoops and his stomach heaves dangerously, but all he can see is Steve fighting his way out of a burning, crashing ship, alone again.

"Okay, good. Good, Steve." He tries to put on a smile, tenderness in his voice even as the smoke starts pouring out of the building, blackening the blue sky. "You getting ready to jump? I can see it getting pretty low to the water."

He hears a laugh that sounds sort of like a sob. "I'm stuck," Steve says. "A beam fell on me. I think..."

"No. Steve. You promised me. You get out from under that beam and jump out of that helicarrier. You do not get to give up. Do you hear me? That's an order." Bucky is yelling now. The wind is hitting his face as hard as Sam carries them away, making his cheeks feel raw. He keeps his eyes fixed on the shuddering helicarrier, straining desperately like he can find Steve amidst the fire, smoke and metal. "You hear me? You are not going down this time. You are getting off that goddamn plane."

Steve groans in his ear and then Bucky hears metal scraping and a strangled shout that makes his throat clench in fear. "Okay, Buck," Steve says, consonants slurring together like he’s not quite conscious. "I'm up and I'm headed toward the south side. I'm gonna..." He trails off, wheezing.

"Head's up. Gonna drop you right here." Sam is dropping low near a parking garage and Bucky bends his knees. The impact is hard and he rolls out of it, helping Maria up with him. Sam circles for a second just above them, already looking back toward the river. "I'm gonna fly back and try to get him..."

Bucky almost feels the explosion before he hears it, a rush of heat that almost knocks him off his feet and sets off all the car alarms around them. He turns and sees the charlie ship imploding against a cloudless sky, smoke mushrooming up. Before, he could see the metal framework and the giant hull even with all the smoke and flames, but now everything is rolling fire plummeting into the river.

"Steve!" he yells into his earpiece. "Steve! Answer me."  Nothing but static comes through.

 


	8. The Aftermath.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Picking up the pieces.

_The aftermath._

 

All Bucky had wanted to do in those first breathless seconds after the charlie ship exploded was to go find Steve, to dive into the Potomac himself and swim and swim until he could pull Steve to safety or he ran out of oxygen. His sense of duty had ultimately prevailed, though. So when Maria gets back into contact with the White House, he doesn’t protest when they immediately send out a security detail to pick them up and drive them back.

He gets to see Natasha briefly before the motorcade whisks him away, and he hugs her as tight as he can, minding her cracked ribs and the lump the size of an egg on her head.

“We’ll find him for you,” she promises in his ear, voice smoke hoarse. “I’ll bring him back.”

Bucky can’t find the words to reply but he’s sure that she can see the fear all over his face. He trusts that she will bring him back - he just doesn't dare imagine the state Steve will be in. Watching the Triskelion fade behind him as they speed back to the White House, lights and sirens going, is one of the hardest things he’s ever had to do. Everyone is tense. His security detail is bare bones and all have their guns in full view, checking over their shoulder at every turn.

“Rollins was Hydra,” Bucky tells Maria, leaning back against the seat. He clenches his flesh hand in his sooty suit pants, trying to keep it from shaking. With the other, he reaches up and rolls Steve’s engagement ring through his fingers.

She nods. “Rumlow too. We’re still clearing the White House - but we should be completed by the time you get back. The secret service…” she hesitates and looks around at the men who surround them. “These are the only agents we could verify weren’t Hydra.”

Bucky looks around and nods. “Thank you.”

The streets of D.C. are deadly silent and they make it to the White House gates in record time. When they speed by the makeshift memorial to Steve (now deserted like the rest of the streets), Bucky has to take a deep breath to keep the tears pricking his eyes from going any further

When he gets back to the White House, the first order of business is to mobilize the National Guard and the marines, getting them down to the Triskelion to provide security and help with search and rescue. The terror alert level gets raised and, after a short debate, international flights out of the US are halted for twelve hours to give Homeland Security the time to flag passports of suspected Hydra members.

Almost immediately after that, he establishes a Hydra task force to take care of some of the critical mop up and data sorting. After some debate, he decides to assign Peggy's niece, Sharon Carter, as the task force head, pulling her off field duty for the CIA. She is young for the job; but in this Hydra-infested world, one of the few people he absolutely trusts to NOT be Hydra is any relative of a Peggy Carter's.

Within two hours after the Triskelion fell, he’s met with Congressmen and the Joint Chiefs and the Pentagon and Nick Fury (who handed over his resignation without fanfare - Bucky knows better than to argue). He appoints two judges just to assign arrest warrants for undercover Hydra operatives - and then, an hour later, has to appoint another judge when one of the first two judges is revealed to be a Hydra agent herself. A dozen members of his staff and another 90% of the Vice President's staff are arrested. On top of that, Maria tells him that a handful of his kitchen staff were arrested and replacements need to be found. The Secret Service is in complete disarray. At this point, it’s shorter to get a list of who _isn’t_ Hydra in that organization than who is.

Three hours after the helicarriers had crash into the Potomac, Bucky gives a televised address from the Oval Office. He sits down for it, changes into a dark suit jacket and white shirt brought over from the residence and makes sure a flag pin is pinned to his lapel. He shoos the makeup artist away when she comes over with concealer. In the bathroom mirror, he looks haggard and he has an ugly purple bruise on his jaw. The American people deserve to see that, he decides.

He sits at the big desk and watches his staff crowd and fidget behind the single camera. They’re all scared too, he realizes. Many of them lost people, too. They don’t know if their partners, friends, and family are all okay. They’re all here with him instead of with them, just like he is. Deliberately, he inhales and then exhales, lets his shoulders settle into the mantle of a leader. “Okay,” he tells the cameraman. “I’m ready.”

When the cameras start rolling though, Bucky keeps his hands folded so no one can see them shaking. In a steady voice, he explains to them, as best he can, what had happened that morning at the Triskelion. The clips of Steve’s speech at the Triskelion have been all over the news channels for hours so he just confirms that a decades-old Nazi cult is back in business. He announces the creation of the Hydra task force and the betrayal and death of Alexander Pierce. He reassures his nation that they still have a working, committed government that will keep them safe. He offers condolences to those who have lost loved ones and prayers for those who are still missing. His voice only goes hoarse and cracked once: when he says that Captain Steve Rogers is missing in action after taking down the final helicarrier. “I remain hopeful,” he says with some effort, “for his safe return.” It’s only when the camera stops broadcasting that he realizes he has tears in his eyes. Maria hands him a tissue and doesn't say a word.

For his staff, for his country, he tries to stay focused. He really tries. Bucky goes to the place in his head where things are calm and quiet, the place he'd first found in the battlefield, and he shuts down everything but the job. Someone makes sure the coffee mug at his elbow is always full and someone else shoves granola bars in his hands. He just feels numb.

A little of the numbness is the whiplash transition from the life-and-death battle over the river to an office with dozens of people in nice suits. When he first sees his name flash by on the Insight target list, his lungs twist coldly. He was supposed to have died today. He would have died today if it hadn't been for Steve.

Steve. His Steve. Steve is probably lying at the bottom of the river. Every time the thought crosses his mind, he has to tamp it down with brutal force just to keep on functioning.

In the beginning, the first time Steve had died in the Atlantic, he'd wallowed in it. When Peggy had come to the hospital to tell him, he'd turned his face to the wall and refused to speak for three days. It had taken his ma crying at his bedside and Becca laying her little baby son against his side before he'd forced himself up out of that bed. He'd dragged himself through the motions of life because there were people relying on him. He hadn't been able to keep it up for long - but as a temporary coping measure until the war had been won, it had worked just dandy. After that, he had spiraled down again.

So he's holding it together and focusing on being president. Now and then, however, his eyes will catch on that stupid picture of Steve from his USO tour on his desk and the stupid new picture of him and Steve from the Rolling Stone magazine article that is newly framed right next to the first. In the new picture, they’re standing in profile on the White House veranda and someone had made Steve laugh, so he’s looking over Bucky’s shoulder with this big goofy grin lighting up his whole face. Bucky’s hands are tucked in Steve’s back pockets and he’s smiling at Steve softly – Bucky can see the raw emotion written all over his own face. He's had to turn away a couple times, just put his back to the room and stare at the sun until his eyes stop itching and his chest feels less tight. The deep, painful pit in his stomach is constant, though.

Sam, Tony, and Natasha are still out looking for Steve, scouring the riverbanks and the surrounding tree line. On top of that, the National Guard, two Marine battalions, and divers from the Coast Guard are also dredging the river for any survivors or bodies they can find. They'll find him, one way or another. They'll find him and they'll bring him home and it won't be like last time when Bucky made an annual pilgrimage to the middle of the fucking Atlantic to look for his lover's bones amid the dark waters. This will be simpler, more final. This will be a body bag and a morgue and a cause of death and a fucking funeral and a casket and a stone and, in 70 years, Steve will still be dead. Bucky will be able to stand over Steve's grave and know that Steve's decaying body is six feet below him.

If his hand shakes a little every time he signs his name, no one says anything. If he loses his train of thought occasionally, someone just pours him more coffee. There is one moment, later in the afternoon when he still hasn't heard from any of them, when he stares at his calendar and mentally ticks of the 41 months of presidency he has left - the 41 months he needs to be strong. Then, he could join Steve. His responsibilities would be complete. He could just slip off into the sunset. He ends up snapping his pen in two pieces - Maria just hands him another one.

It's almost seven pm before he finally gets to sit down without any interruption and breathe for a moment. He's clutching a bottle of Gatorade and his personal physician is wiping up the last few little cuts that haven't healed over yet with an alcohol swab when Maria comes up holding a phone. Her face is closed off when she hands it over.

"For you, sir," she says, betraying nothing with her tone.

This could be a call about anything. Maria, after all, has been handing him the phone all day long with calls from across the globe. Deep in his gut, though, he knows.

He takes the phone and puts it to his ear and does his best to shut out the rest of the office. "Yes?" His voice is raspy and his chest is tight again.

"Bucky?" It's Tony and there isn’t any wise crack – just his name in a way too serious tone.

"I'm here." He puts his head down, and then shields his face with his metal hand so no one around him will have to witness this. "Just... Just tell me, Tony."

"We found him on the riverbank couple miles downriver. He must've... I don't know how he did it but he must've swum out of all that debris. He's... He's still alive."

Whatever tenuous strength Bucky has held onto for the past hours slips and he feels his eyes start burning with tears. The relief is like an electric shock, a jolt of adrenaline, bringing him back to the land of the living from whatever ghost state that he'd been wandering in, devoid of light and air all day long. If he’d been standing, Bucky’s pretty sure he would’ve fallen over.

Tony is still talking and Bucky does his best to tune back into his fast words. "The doctors don't know what to expect - he should be dead by all logic. I have Bruce Banner flying in from New York. You know that if someone is an expert in serum enhanced physiology, it's him - but it's sort of ‘wait and see’."

Bucky looks up. "Maria, we need to bring the car around." Then to Tony, "I'm coming. Which hospital?"

They get to the hospital in record time, sirens going all the way. Bucky is jittery the entire ride, snaps at Maria and then apologizes. His phone won’t stop ringing, heads of state and Pentagon officials, and Bucky does his best to focus on their needs but his thoughts keep drifting. Steve is alive. That’s all that matters.

When they get there, thankfully, there’s no press outside the hospital, yet. Bucky sees a couple people filming with their phones as he practically sprints from the motorcade to the doors and knows it won’t be long before the news crews show up. Inside, the Marines already have guards posted outside the ICU and Natasha is sitting on the floor outside the room the nurses point him to, face still smudged with smoke and bits of hair falling from her ponytail.

Bucky goes to her immediately, pulls her into his arms, and winds his fingers through her hair. He knows she can feel how badly he's trembling, finally crashing from the adrenaline of the day. “Thank you,” he murmurs in her ear.

She grips him back just as tight and he can feel a few tears soak the fabric of his shirt.

“Mr. President?” A flock of doctors are standing just feet away, all looking grave and washed out in the dim lighting. Maria has assured him that they’ve all been vetted, but he finds himself eying them all suspiciously anyway. “If you would come with us, we’ll update you on Captain Roger’s status and next steps.”

“Can you,” Bucky breathes out through his nose. “I just want to see him for a second. Before I go with you.” He steadies himself against Natasha for a moment and then turns to look through the glass window into Steve’s room, ignoring the Marines standing at attention on either side of the frame.

Steve is propped up in the bed with a tube in his mouth and bruising covering his face. There are bandages around his middle with drainage tubes coming out of his chest and one arm and both legs are splinted. He's pale and his eyes are closed but his chest is rising and falling steadily. He’s alive.

Bucky puts his hand on the glass, pressing hard as if Steve can feel it, and doesn't move until he senses Natasha coming to stand next to him.

"Go," she says softly, squeezing his hand. "I will watch over him."

Steve's list of injuries, when the doctors read them off to him in a small, poorly lit conference room a few feet from his room, is impressive to say the least. Fractured skull, broken femur, dislocated knee, broken wrist, broken jaw, eight broken ribs, collapsed lung, three bullet holes in his gut (one of which had hit his liver and another that was buried in his small intestine) and another in his shoulder, multiple contusions and scrapes, and a fractured hip. He swallowed about a gallon of river water so they were concerned about pneumonia - or at least they would be if it wasn't for the serum. The doctors all seemed a bit bewildered. Any other patient, they'd have already have signed the death certificate and Bucky would be crying into a counselor's shoulder. Steve was still unconscious and his vitals were weak, but they'd even improved a little in the couple hours since he'd been here. They wanted to do surgery right away to remove the bullet fragments and set the ribs.

“Before surgery, I want to be next to him for a bit,” Bucky tells them. “Just a little while.” They look indecisive and he plows on. “You said he’s already doing better. Just five minutes. Please.”

Finally, one of the doctors nods. “We’ll come get him for surgery in 15 minutes.” His eyes are kind and he smiles a little. “Your fiancé is strong, Mr. President. I have every hope that he will continue to heal.”

Back at Steve’s room, the security detail waits out in the hall with Natasha and he slips through the wide door. It's quiet and dim in the room except for the click-hiss of the respirator and the beep of machines.

Steve's hand is lying next to his side, two long fingers splinted together and the wrist swollen. When Bucky picks it up (delicately, with both hands, like it's a baby bird he needs to protect), he sees blood and grime still under the fingernails. He brushes a kiss to them anyway.

The only scent in the room is antiseptic and rubber, nothing that remotely reminds him of Steve. All of the strength and the coiled energy inside of Steve have been sapped away, leaving this white, limp figure on a hospital bed. Still, the relief he feels to see Steve breathing in front of him is thunderous in its intensity, welling up in his heart and flowing over until he almost feels like he could burst from it. Steve is back with him. Steve is alive next to him again. Everything else can be worked out with time and patience.

He leans down, presses a kiss to a small, un-bruised section of Steve's face. "I found you," he whispers into the shell of his ear. "I found you. Now come back to me." For long moments, he just stands there, listening to Steve breathe and feeling the warmth of his skin. There’s a soft rap on the door, signaling his time is up, and Bucky squeezes his hand once more and forces himself to step away.

When he steps back out in the fluorescent hallway while they prep Steve to take him to the operating room, Maria is already there. She is embracing Natasha tightly while another man is leaning against the wall with his shoulders slumped, dirty and exhausted. When he sees Bucky though, he straightens up to an approximation of parade rest. Military, then.

Natasha pulls back and wipes her eyes, even though Bucky doesn't see any tears. "James," she says and it's a mark of how exhausted she is that she doesn't call him Mr. President. "This is Sam. He's the one who found Steve."

Oh, the Falcon.

Bucky extends his hand. "Thank you," he says. His voice is so raw that it's almost surprising to his own ears. "Also, for pulling me and Maria out of the Triskelion and taking care of the beta ship."

Sam shakes his hand. Up close, Bucky can see the bruises on his face and the weariness in his eyes. "Just doing my duty, Mr. President. We haven't found his shield yet, but they'll let us know as soon as they do."

The smile on his face feels sticky and awkward. "Pretty sure this is the definition of above and beyond."

Steve, they tell him, had washed up down the river, caught in a slow moving current that tangled him up in some overhanging tree roots. Sam had only seen him by luck, swooping low and catching a flash of blonde in the muck and branches. When Stark and Sam had pulled him out and onto the bank, he'd been bleeding like a stuck pig all over their hands. With the sheer number of victims who needed help, an evac helicopter hadn't been an option, so Tony had carried him, with Falcon spotting, to the queue of ambulances that had been waiting near Triskelion. It had been a good thing he had: Steve had stopped breathing on his own almost as soon as the paramedics got him loaded in the ambulance. Natasha had ridden with him to the hospital and Bucky can tell by her face that it had been harrowing.

Behind them, there is a clatter and the door swings open, medical personnel hovering around the bed as they move Steve toward the operating room. Bucky steps back to stay out of the way, turning his head just enough so he can talk to Maria but still watch the stretcher as it goes down the hallway, straining until the last glimpse of Steve’s blonde head disappears around the corner. "I want the security around him tripled. Okay? Nothing happens to him. And I'm staying here until he's out of the woods."

"Yes, sir. We've already set up a conference room down the hall for your use." She gestures the opposite direction from the operating room.

He stumbles, legs finally starting to register how exhausted he is, but somehow he makes it to the conference room. His aides are already spreading out their laptops and phones over the table. There is TV in the corner, playing CNN quietly. Bucky sinks into a chair and stares at screen numbly

Forty-six are confirmed dead and 163 are still missing, says the scroll at the bottom. Three hundred and twelve others are already in custody under suspicion of working for Hydra. Captain Steve Rogers is among the missing. Vice President Alexander Pierce is among the dead and is thought to be the mastermind behind the Hydra plot.

He has to pick a new Vice President, Bucky suddenly remembers. He groans and sinks down into the ugly hospital meeting-room chair. "Maria, send out a press alert that Steve is alive and in surgery. I also need a list of possible new VPs."

With nothing else to do, Bucky throws himself into the work. They’re lifting the flight restrictions soon and the Pentagon is in full panic mode as it tries to prioritize Hydra agents by risk of flight level, pulling in as many as they can and alerting international agencies. Once the travel ban is lifted, Bucky knows that hundred of agents will disappear across borders, never to be seen again. They’ve already apprehended a dozen trying to cross into Mexico and another handful crossing into Canada.

Outside the room, he can hear the Marines and Secret Service switching shifts and doctors hustling down the hallway. No one comes in though.

“Can’t I just appoint you?” he asks Maria Hill plaintively around midnight, when the VP short list they present him with seems depressingly short and irritating. “I don’t like any of these people.”

“You don’t have to like them, sir,” Maria tells him and ignores his first question.

A little white later, Tony drops in. He’s in a neat suit but his hair is mussed. “Bruce is here,” he tells Bucky, sitting on his right and leaning close like he’s a kid sharing secrets. “He scrubbed in just a few minutes ago to help with the sedation levels. He says it’s looking good. He’ll keep monitoring, make sure Steve isn’t in any pain.”

Bucky nods, feeling the grit in his eyes burn. “Tell him thank you.” He breathes out, trying to ease the tension in shoulders. “Do they know how much longer?”

Tony shakes his head. “Soon, Bucky. Don’t worry. He’ll be okay.”

Bucky wants to believe him - but he doesn’t think he’ll be able to fully relax until he can see Steve for himself. He tries for a smile though and, at least, that seems to make Tony feel a little better.

Shortly before 3 am, there’s a soft tap at the conference room door and the surgeon comes in, scrub cap still on and white coat open. He looks exhausted, bags under his eyes, but he’s smiling.

Bucky freezes in his chair, hand gripping the table, torn between standing and staying where he is. “Can we have the room?” he manages to choke out, eyes never leaving the doctor as his aides file out and Maria closes the door behind them. Alone with the doctor, Bucky scrubs his face with his flesh hand and nods. “Okay. Tell me.”

“Captain Rogers is very lucky,” the doctor tells him, without preamble as if sensing Bucky’s nervous energy. “He’s going to be okay. The serum is remarkable. He’s healing quicker than we could’ve ever hoped. Once we got in there, it was more of a matter of just pulling out the bullet and clearing bone fragments. His organs and bones are already well on their way to full health. We have him in recovery now - but you can go sit with him shortly if you want.”

“Thank you,” Bucky manages, mouth dry and feeling a little dizzy with relief. “I can’t… thank you.” He clears his throat. “Will you tell my chief of staff? They’ll want to do a press conference. If you wouldn’t mind…” Maria will make sure Natasha, Tony, and Wilson all hear the news too.

“Of course.” The doctor smiles again and then starts to turn to go out the door. “Oh!” he says and turns back. “Congratulations on your upcoming wedding.”

Bucky barks a surprise laugh, the noise easing some of the tension in the room. His wedding. He’d almost forgotten. Bucky reaches up and grabs the engagement ring, feels it clack against his own. “Thank you. I’m pretty excited myself.”

 

* * *

 

Steve wakes up in degrees. Everything is blurry and bright and his face hurts, a jagged pain along his cheek that reminds him of getting punched in the mouth. His entire middle feels leaden and his arms and legs ache all over. He blinks hard then closes his eyes again, groaning.

A cool, metal hand cups his, rubbing over his fingers. "Easy, easy," says a warm voice and Steve tries to smile even though it hurts.

Bucky. Bucky is okay.

He doesn't open his eyes again but the fingers keep tracing up and down the inside of his forearm, stroking some pattern that he can't identify but soothes him completely. Bucky alternately whispers gentle words and hums something low that reminds him of a lullaby from long ago. Steve lets himself relax, go boneless against the mattress.

They'd made it.

He hadn't been so sure for a while that they would. The thought comforts him and he drifts again.

Hearing Bucky's voice as Hydra agents had chased him down the hallways of the helicarrier had been both a gift and a curse. Bucky, in his ear while he was facing down enemies, was like coming home, in a way. On the other hand, it meant that Bucky wasn't safe in a bunker somewhere while Steve burned down one of his intelligence agencies.

By the time that Bucky's voice had come over his earpiece, Steve had already taken a bullet to the shoulder but he hadn't actually been scared until the targeting chip hadn't worked when he’d finally managed to shove it into place. His stomach had dropped through his boots and he'd stared at the red blinking light and knew that if he didn't think fast, Bucky would be dead within a couple minutes. Not just Bucky: Peggy, Natasha, Tony, so many other good men and women. He'd spun around to the computer next to all the chips then, and realized what he could do.

It hadn't even been a choice. When Bucky's voice had crackled over, hoarse and disbelieving, Steve had almost smiled because it was just like being back home, eighty years ago. And, he had fully intended to keep his promise to make it off the helicarrier, leaving Bucky was the last thing he had wanted to do. As soon as Hill started to remotely trigger the core, he'd turned around and started running for the upper deck, ignoring the burning pain in his shoulder.

He would've made it easily too, with time to spare, if it hadn't been for goddamn Brock Rumlow.

The first gunshot had caught him by surprise, slamming into his back as he ran down the hallway, spinning him halfway around and throwing him into a bulkhead. The second and third had caught him square in the middle before Steve managed to get his shield up and toss it. It wasn't a great throw - but it knocked Rumlow back into the wall and it gave Steve the time to get his legs under him.

Beneath his feet, there had been a massive lurch and the sound of explosions setting off with the crackling rush of fire just behind it. There hadn’t been any more time. He had turned, running desperately for the upper deck.

That was when Sam had spotted the alpha ship veering toward the Triskelion and Steve had known what the scuffle with Rumlow had cost him. There wasn't going to be a safe pick up for him - but that was okay, all that mattered was that Bucky got out alive and intact. When Sam had finally agreed and flown for the Triskelion, Steve had sagged in relief against the wall for just a moment. Bucky would be okay. On his next step up the stairs, he had staggered hard, blood loss starting to drag down on him. He was going to make it though. He forced himself onward, focusing on Bucky and the smoky blue sky above. There had been only a couple steps left when Rumlow had tackled him from behind.

Normally, Rumlow wouldn't even be close to a match for him, but Steve was full of bullets and his blood was a wide, leaking trail behind him. Steve could see the hazy sky of the outer deck just a few feet away, gray orange smoke rolling across in bellowing plumes. He'd been so close - that had been all he could think as he and Rumlow had grappled at the top of the stairwell - there was just a few feet between him and the open air.

The explosion from the deck below had taken them both by surprise. Steve had been flung one way, through the glass wall and out onto the deck pinned across his upper legs by a thick beam, maybe twenty feet from the edge of the helicarrier.

Rumlow hadn't been so lucky. He'd been thrown back against the interior wall, crisscrossing steel beams across his chest. Steve had just one moment to lock eyes with him and then the flames had surged from the lower deck, swallowing him whole even as he had screamed.

That was when Bucky had called him over the comms. Steve had struggled with the beam over his own legs but he hadn't been able to get the right leverage and his vision was starting to go fuzzy at the edges. Then Bucky had demanded, had yelled, and Steve had tapped into one last reserve of strength deep inside and shoved himself free of the beam with a cry. Both legs were broken. He had staggered upright, just barely, pulled along by the need to not let Bucky down. He'd been heading toward the south side, planning to just throw himself off and hope for the best. He had been so close, just steps away, when he'd felt the concussive boom take him from behind.

He remembers the sky spinning crazily, smoke and fire blurring together, and seeing the pieces of the helicarrier falling around him. He'd had one last moment of deep regret for leaving Bucky behind again, and then nothing as he’d hit the water.

That is, nothing until now.

After what seems like moment, but was probably much longer, he opens his watering eyes again, blinking hard against the lights, even though they seem to be dimmer now. He tries to shift again and feels the tug of sutures and staples, sharp biting stings cutting through whatever is in the clear IV bag hanging above him.

Hazily, he thinks that there must be enough drugs in there to down an elephant if they are making him feel this floaty. He cuts his eyes to the side and Bucky is there, sleeping now.

His head is drooped so his chin touches his chest and his hair is sticking up every which way like he's been running his fingers through it for hours. There is a fading green bruise on the side of his chin, extending down toward his neck. One hand is tucked up around Steve's, fingers loosely curled like a tiny bird foot. He's wearing a button down still but the top three buttons are popped and the collar is completely askew. Even in the dim fluorescent lighting, he's stunning.

Steve concentrates on his uncooperative body and manages to flutter his fingers against Bucky's, twisting just enough so that he can grip back with the very pads of his fingertips. Bucky’s fingers are warm and soft.

Bucky makes a snuffling noise and then his eyes slide open, blinking. When he sees that Steve's awake, his entire face softens, mouth curving up so the bruise looks like it's tugging painfully. "Hey, hey, you're awake," he says and his voice is so warm and steady. "Just take it easy and tell me if you're in any pain. Stark brought in Dr. Banner from New York - he knows some things about serum enhanced physiology and they've been trying to get your medication right." He's talking fast, doing that thing he does when Steve knows he nervous.

Steve tries to say Bucky's name but he's pretty sure he just makes a weird croaking noise. He manages to get his lips to move in a smile though and he squeezes against Bucky's fingers as best he can.

"Here, they said you'd be thirsty." Bucky brings over a plastic yellow cup with a straw sticking out of it and Steve is never so grateful as when the room temperature water hits his tongue.

"You saved me," he says, when Bucky takes the cup away.

Bucky smiles and touches his face. "Sam found you on the riverbank. You were pretty banged up."

Steve frowns. "You should see the other guy." The words come out in a whisper over his raw throat but it's worth it when Bucky throws back his head and laughs.

"Steve, I think the entire world has seen the other guy." He leans forward and kisses Steve's forehead. "It's sort of been on all the news channels."

"Hydra? It's gone?" He looks toward the window, sees the darkness of night beyond the pale blue curtains. How long has it been?

Bucky makes a face. "Well. You and your merry men made quite a dent - but there's a lot of cleanup to do. Fury handed me his resignation a few hours ago. I'm pretty sure he's off Hydra-hunting in Europe."

"And Pierce?"

"He's dead. Natasha killed him while you guys were on the helicarriers." Bucky looks pleased about that. "And I had to basically replace our entire security detail. Oh, and our chef. It's going to be a lot of work."

Steve hears the unspoken words behind that. Bucky will be gone more - more days when Steve will only see Bucky as they crawl into bed, more days when Steve misses him like a deep hole in his chest.

"You're a hero, Steve," Bucky murmurs, squeezing his hand. "The nation owes you a debt of gratitude."

Steve feels that warm bubble of satisfaction that comes from a job well done. And, that last part... well, that sounds promising. "Really?"

"Did you know," Bucky says, leaning over the bed, "that the president is considered the nation's top diplomat?" He presses a kiss to the side of his mouth, careful to avoid the bruises. "It's my responsibility to make sure that our debts are paid."

It's perfect. Steve kisses him back and then winces sharply when the stitches in his cheek pull.

Bucky backs off, looking slightly abashed. "We should probably give it a few hours - and I should go tell the others you're awake. They've all been waiting. Do you feel up for it?"

Steve should. He should see his team and congratulate them on a job well done. He should be Captain America. But, right at this very second, all he wants is Bucky. "Not yet," he says, letting himself be selfish for a bit longer. "Can you just..." He tugs at Bucky's hand a little and, like always, Bucky gets it.

The hospital bed dips a little when Bucky slides in next to him, pausing briefly when he shrugs out of his button down so he's left in just his undershirt. He toes off his shoes and then curls against Steve's side, sliding one arm around his shoulders and wrapping the other over his stomach so Steve feels surrounded by him, small and safe like he’s a 19 again. "It's late anyway," Bucky says. "Or, well, early. You should get some more sleep. Heal. Even that big fancy body of yours needs some rest.”

"I love you," Steve whispers. "I'm sorry I scared you." He looks down at his hand and realizes that his engagement ring is back on his finger, shining dully in the light. Carefully, he curls his hand around it, imagining he can feel the James Buchanan Barnes inscribed against his skin.

Bucky tucks his chin over Steve’s head. "You've been doing that to me every day that I've had you with me. Taking on things that were way bigger than you. Pneumonia, bullies, Nazis, Hydra. A whole goddamn helicarrier." He strokes Steve's stomach; thumb circling just under the bandages. "You're everything to me, you know that right?" Steve can't see his face but he hears the wetness. "Every day you were gone, I felt like I only had half a heart. When you came back, I was truly happy again. I can't lose you. And if sometimes I'm over protective and an idiot, it's just because I've already experienced the worst moment of my life and I can't do it again. Okay? You're stuck with me this time. End of the line. Anywhere you go, we're going together."

"Together," Steve agrees, mouth feeling heavy with exhaustion. "Don't want to be anywhere without you anyway." His eyes are closing again and Bucky's slow strokes along his side are soothing.

"I don't think I've ever told you," Bucky says, quiet like he's not actually talking to Steve, words just lilting along like it's a bedtime story, "but, I have a plan. For after I'm done being president. We'll get a little brownstone in Brooklyn. You'll have a studio and I'll have a little office. We'll do whatever we want. Just us. Together. We'll live to be 300 and watch the city change around us. But it'll be okay. Because it'll be you and me, together. We'll go to the moon together. I'm sure Tony will have that figured out soon."

When Steve shifts his head just right, he can hear Bucky's heartbeat under his shirt. Bucky keeps murmuring about space and art and the sound lulls him into the best sleep he's had in the twenty-first century.


	9. Ripple effects.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Moving forward.

_Ripple effects._

 

Two days later, Steve checks himself out of the hospital.

Bucky is nervous about how soon after the surgery it is, which means he repeatedly asks if Steve is okay and bites his lip in the corner of the room, but he stands back and lets Steve do what he wants. He even hands over Steve's boots before he gets called away for a meeting with the Justice Department. He’s clearly trying, holding himself back from coddling as much as he can. Steve appreciates it and tries to reassure Bucky of his health as much as he can in return.

The day before, in the process of searching the river, divers had found his shield tangled in the mass of the sunken helicarrier. A nervous-looking Marine had delivered it to the hospital room, holding it awkwardly with both hands like he had been afraid of dropping it. The vibranium had been muck-covered and smelly, but now it sits shining in the corner of Steve's room.

Bucky kisses him before he leaves, standing between Steve's legs as Steve sits on the bed in just a t-shirt and sweatpants. "You'll be home tonight, right?" he asks, settling his hands on Steve's shoulders like he can’t bear to let go. "We'll have a late dinner?" His face is a study in contradictions, desperately clinging to Steve while doing his best to let Steve know he supports him.

"I wouldn't miss it," Steve says, leaning into the touch. There’s literally not anything in the entire world he can think of that sounds better than that. He rubs his thumb over his newly returned engagement ring. They had come so close to losing this, he thinks.

After Bucky leaves to go back to the White House, Natasha shows up with Steve's new security detail, relieving the Marines who had been hanging out in the hallway since his arrival. She'd hand-selected all of them herself. She also has a new suit for him, courtesy of Tony.

"I think he kind of likes you or something," she says, kicking her feet up on the bed as Steve changes in the bathroom. "It's not just anyone that he makes outfits for, you know."

They take just one SUV down to the site of what used to be the Triskelion. There are cranes and rescue crews still spread all over the rubble. Fire engines and ambulances are all clustered on one side and there are black SUVs on the other side for all of the three letter agencies.

The Triskelion had completely collapsed just minutes after the helicarrier had crashed into it. Parts of it had fallen into the Potomac, tumbling into the sublevels of the building, and they were still dredging pieces out miles away. Some of the frame of the building was still intact, sticking up like broken bones dozens of feet in the air while the rubble piled below it in twisted heaps.

Sam is already there, leaning against his Camry in his sunglasses and a windbreaker, and holding two water bottles. "Looking good, Cap," he says as Steve walks up. "Much better than you did a couple days ago."

Steve claps his shoulder and takes one of the water bottles. "Let's get to work."

The work isn't easy. Steve spends his time crawling over the rubble, clearing out chunks that are too big for the regular men but too unstable for the cranes.

No one is completely sure how many people are still trapped beneath. The official missing toll is now at 56 and the death toll is at 63 - but there has been some confusion over who is actually missing and who has just skipped town to avoid arrest for being a member of Hydra.  There are whole rooms at the Pentagon of people going over lists, comparing and tracking down names to make sure they've got everyone.

It's a bigger mess than Steve had ever really imagined when this whole thing had started. Somehow, he'd been picturing it like the ‘40s, where every Hydra agent wore a black mask or had a red skull for a face. He isn't sure he likes this world where the Hydra agent was the White House publicist with the glasses that were too big for his face. Bucky told him that Kevin had been arrested just hours after Steve had arrived at the hospital.

But, this is the only world Steve's got now.

He finds comfort in this work, pulling apart the shattered remains of a building. Steve has found that he likes saving people more than he likes destroying them; the feeling like he's putting something back together. It reminds him that there is still a place for him in this strange, new world. His ribs and stomach only twinge now and then.

The day is windy but bright and when Steve stands at the top of the rubble for a quick break, he can see all the way to the White House.

Steve pulls two bodies from the rubble, recognizing one as Rollins, from Bucky's security detail. "Hydra agent," he says as he steps aside to let the medics with a body bag through. Somehow, it still makes him feel very weary.

When he gets back to the White House, he doesn’t want to just go back to empty rooms. Steve wanders down to the main level, eschewing the stairs that lead to the gym and instead going toward the executive offices. He’s avoided this for months, he realizes. Steve came down here when he was forced because he had an appointment with one of the many staff that surrounded Bucky - but that was it. When he met Bucky for lunch, he would head right to the dining room or the garden. Steve always had the feeling of being watched here.

Now, though, everyone seems too distracted to look at him. They’re hurrying around with their faces buried in their phones or gazing steadfastly at their screens. Unlike last time he visited when everyone had been in neat suits with polished hair, they all seem harried this time, papers strewn over desks and empty coffee cups littered everywhere.

“Steve?” Maria Hill is coming out of an office, holding a laptop open in her arms. “What are you doing down here?”

“Hi.” Steve stuffs his hands in his pockets and smiles. “Is Bucky around?”

She points toward the Oval Office. “He’s meeting with the Hydra subcommittee in there, but they should be done about now.”

“Thanks.” He steps out of the way of two staffers with their noses in folders and then heads in the direction she pointed. As he gets closer to the Oval Office, he starts getting more looks and he does his best to smile and nod. No one tries to approach him, though. With everything that happens, Steve imagines that everyone has better things to do than gawk at the live in boyfriend of the president.

The doorway to the Oval Office is closed when he gets there so he leans against one wall and tries to stay out of the way.

“Captain Rogers?”

He turns and a man in a pressed military uniform, medals heavy across the chest, is standing there, hat in hand. “Yes?” Steve’s ready for the familiar refrain: I had your poster when I was a kid, my father/uncle/grandfather served in WWII, you inspired me to serve my country. Steve’s grateful that he inspires people, but lately it’s become a reminder how he belongs almost a century before.

“I just wanted to say. My daughter worked for SHIELD and she was at the Triskelion, yesterday. What you did, your speech, she told me about it. You inspired a lot of people to take a stand and fight for this country. Thank you.” The general offers his hand and Steve takes it, shakes it firmly.

“I wish I could’ve done more,” Steve says, honestly. “I wish we could’ve stopped it sooner.”

The general smiles. “We’ve caught them now. I think that’s about all anyone can ask for in this situation.”

“Steve?” Bucky is standing in the open door of the Oval Office, his tie is loose around his neck, one side of his hair is flattened awkwardly, and his glasses are sliding down his nose. His shoulders are broad enough that they almost fill the whole doorway and his shirt sleeves are rolled up to his elbows. “I didn’t expect to see you.”

The general nods and steps away and Steve heads toward Bucky. Over Bucky’s shoulder, Steve can see people sitting on the couches. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

“You’re not. We were just finishing up. In fact, c’mere. There’s someone I want you to meet.” Bucky extends his hand, smiling warmly. The light is shining behind him and Steve thinks he’s dazzling.

“Alright, alright.” He comes over and brushes a kiss over Bucky’s cheek, taking advantage of the little bit of height he has on Bucky to drape his arm over Bucky’s shoulders. “See? I told you I would be back in time for dinner.”

Bucky smiles up at him, fond. “You did and you didn’t even get into a fight on the way here.”

“Oh, you don’t know that.” Steve feels something that had been tight in his chest since seeing the Triskelion ease. “I’m always gonna come back, Buck.”

“I’m gonna hold you to that.” Bucky turns and gestures to the room. “Guys, this is Steve. Steve, this is my crack Hydra team.”

The Oval Office is golden with the setting sun, semi-translucent curtains pulled halfway over the tall windows. The two couches in the middle of the room have three women and two men sitting on them, papers and laptops spread out over the coffee table in what looks like chaos. A cup of coffee is sitting on the big desk that Steve knows is Bucky’s.

Steve nods to the team on the couch. “Didn’t mean to interrupt.” There’s something about seeing Bucky in his natural element, forearms bare and glasses on his nose. He looks exhausted but in control, mature in a way that Steve has yet to attain.

Bucky shakes his head. “Don’t worry about it, Steve.” He puts his hips on his hands and surveys the table. “I think we got everything, yeah? We can pick this up in the morning. Sharon, could you hold on a second?”

The other men and women gather up their papers and nod to Steve, slipping out of the room and already texting on their phones.

When it’s just Sharon, Bucky grins at Steve, clearly waiting for something. “Do you recognize her?”

Steve squints.

Sharon steps across the room and extends her hand. “Sharon Carter, Captain. A pleasure to meet you.”

Realization dawns. “Peggy has your high school graduation photo in her room,” he says, shaking her hand. “She thinks the world of you.”

“Oh, god. Well, don’t hold that photo against me.” Sharon casts a look at Bucky. “Let’s just say I had to get Uncle Bucky to escort me to my prom that year.”

The laugh that bursts out is involuntary. “Uncle Bucky?”

“Of course. He was around as long as I could remember. Everyone at my high school was jealous,” Sharon says. “I was the talk of the school for weeks.” Her face turns serious. “President Barnes and Aunt Peggy were huge influences - I heard stories about you all my life. You’ve certainly lived up to all of them and more.”

Steve nods. “Peggy’s very proud of you,” he says again. “That’s very high praise.

Sharon pinks a little and then steps back “Thank you, Captain. It was a pleasure meeting you. But, I have a lot of work to do, so I’ll leave you guys alone.”

When she closes the door, Steve turns back to Bucky. “Do you ever just feel really old?” he asks, only partly kidding.

Bucky smiles, something gentle and sad in his expression. “Pal, we’re both as old as dirt.”

That night, he and Bucky get Thai delivered from Bucky’s favorite place in the city and eat in the living room, sitting on the floor with their plates balanced in their laps like they’re kids.

“This isn’t going to be easy,” Bucky says, leaning against the coffee table and looking more exhausted than Steve can ever remember seeing. “We’re going to have a long road to make sure we’re all safe again.” He has stripped out of shirt and jacket, wearing a t-shirt and sweats and looking soft in the yellow lamplight.

Steve laces their fingers together, watches the way their engagements rings catch the glow together. “You’re not alone anymore, Buck. Okay? Whatever we need, I’ll help you with it. We’re gonna do this together.”

Bucky smiles at him. His face is softened around the edges, settled and steady amidst all of the chaos. “Together,” he agrees. “No more sidelining you.”

“And no more parades,” Steve adds and Bucky laughs.

“I’ll see what I can do,” he says.

They end up pulling the couch cushions onto the floor and curling together among them, plates and takeout containers forgotten on the coffee table. Steve wakes up when the sun starts coming through the curtains; Bucky’s head is resting on his chest and he’s snuffling a little in his sleep.

Normally, Bucky would be gone by now. Steve wraps his arm more securely around Bucky’s shoulders and closes his eyes again. Duties can wait for a little bit.

 

* * *

 

Tony Stark comes calling to the White House the next week. He has a black eye and he's limping a little, but otherwise Steve would've never known that he'd taken on Hydra a few days before.

"Bucky's not going to be back for awhile," Steve says when they sit down together at the kitchen table. Stark had asked for whiskey but Steve had poured them both glasses of water. Yesterday, congress has announced its intention to hold official hearings over both Project Insight and the Hydra revelations so Bucky had left for the Capitol before dawn.

"Oh I know. Your boy is all over the news. Subcommittee after subcommittee. Not to mention needing to pick a new VP and rounding up all the traitors in his own government and convincing the American people that he really is one of the good guys. I do not envy him. No, big guy, I wanted to talk to you."

Steve has learned, in the short amount of time that he's known Tony, it's better just to stay quiet and let him get to his point when he's good and ready. It reminds him of Howard, though he has learned from Bucky to never tell Tony that fact.

He likes Tony. At first, he’d just tolerated him because Bucky was so fond of him. But, at some point between the SUV exploding the helicarriers falling from the sky, Steve had found himself counting the man among his friends.

"There were pictures all over the news, you know, of you climbing all over that rubble yesterday in that dashing uniform I sent over. It was quite a hit. Captain America, the First Gentleman, doing his part for the masses. Good stuff."

"You know I didn't do it for that." Steve hadn't been too happy about the photos when he'd seen them on the news sites that night. Journalists and photographers hadn't been allowed near the rubble but many of them had been camped out just across the river with telephoto lenses.

"Oh, I know. Because you are a genuinely good guy. An American hero. No wonder my dad couldn't shut up about you. Not to mention, Bucky." Tony makes a complicated face and shrug like it's not worth talking about. He drums his fingers on the table and then leans forward. "The people of America need a hero like that right now.”

Steve raises his eyebrows and but stays silent. The first time he'd gotten an offer like this from a quick, smooth-talker, he'd jumped in with both feet and found himself on a stage in a chorus line with a card full of lines to learn. He's not planning on doing that again. There's enough going on of that here.

"Sure, I'm Iron Man and they love that and I throw the fancy parties with the flashing lights and I save a bus load of beauty queens now and then and all the papers love it. But, you. You are apple pie and baseball and sunshine and helping little old ladies across the street while saluting the American flag with a bald eagle on your shoulder. You're a living legend. Google searches on 'Captain America' have gone through the roof since your little speech at the Triskelion got out. And they were already high after you did your Charming Prince Frozen impression. What I'm saying is," Tony centers himself and folds his hands together like he’s praying. "Will you please come be Captain America again? For real?"

"How? The Army..."

Tony shakes his head. "Not for the Army and not for SHIELD. For me. And this isn't some kinky role-play thing, I swear. I'm sure someone's told you by now that I'm basically richer than god. And they're not exaggerating. Back before, with the whole aliens and the Tesseract and the gods in the desert, Fury and I, we talked. There was a plan for a group. A collective, if you will, of enhanced humans who were going to band together and be a team against all these new threat. SHIELD was bankrolling and ultimately, it didn't pan out because, well, we don't all play well with others and SHIELD was Hydra. But, now, I think, with you and a few other modifications, we may have a dynamic that works. And it wouldn't be taxpayers! It would be me. We'd be a private agency. I can offer a very competitive salary and benefits."

Steve stares at the shiny fridge and the dark hallway that leads to their bedroom, all of the pieces of this little life that he's fit himself into in this brand new century. He thinks about being busier than he is now - seeing Bucky less. "I'd have to talk to Bucky," he says hesitantly. “I don't think… we couldn't be a private army.”

Tony shakes his head. “Not a private army, no.” He waves his hands in the air like he's painting a picture. “A relief organization. Superheroes without Borders. We’re working on the name. A way for us to do some good. Earthquakes, hurricanes, war zones. I saw you out there, the whole world saw you out there. You, we, could do so much good. You’d be the next Princess Diana.”

“I don’t know who that is.” Steve looks down and laces his fingers. “You’re sure? No fighting? I can’t do that if I’m going to marry Bucky.”

“Well, if the aliens come back, I make no promises.”

Steve can see Bucky’s coffee cup from this morning, sitting in the sink, gone before sun. There will be a time, Steve thinks, where they both can rest and spend their days getting lost in each other. This, however, is not that time. “I think,” Steve clears his throat, letting himself feel the first brush of excitement over this. “I think I would like that.”

The smile on Tony’s face is brilliant. “Yes, of course. Wonderful. Here's my card. Let me know when you want to come see the Tower and I'll send a helicopter."

"The tower?"

"Yes. I'm renaming Stark Tower. It's going to be the tower for our team now. For training, planning, research. Like I said, we’re working on the name. A floor for everyone. All of the toys. All of the latest gadgets. Huge gyms. Bucky said you had a motorcycle during the war? We have motorcycles. All of them and I can get more."

Steve can’t stop a full smile now. "You've already gotten other people on board with this whole crazy thing?”

"Bruce Banner, myself, Natasha. Her buddy, Clint, is going to come out of retirement for this. Thor the alien god has said he's down to play when he's on planet. Your pal, Sam. My pal, Rhodey. It's a solid team, Cap. You'll love it."

Steve finds that he's smiling. "You know, somehow, I think that you're right."

 

* * *

 

The morning of Steve's congressional testimony dawns bright and beautiful. He goes running, full security detail in tow, while it's still dark out and watches the sun rise from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. His security detail sags to the steps around him and tries to catch their breaths. It’s September now and the first brushes of fall are cutting through the humidity that has swamped the city for months.

In the six weeks since the launch of Project Insight, Steve's been prepped extensively for this testimony by a bevy of Bucky's staff. Out of respect for his “situation” (something that Steve’s now heard parroted on every cable news show out there), Steve is the last member of Team Cap (a moniker that the cable news channels had come up with in the early days to describe the four of them) to appear before the congressional subcommittee. Natasha had been the first one to go, followed by Tony, Maria and Sam. They had attempted to subpoena Fury, but the man had successfully disappeared off of the map.

Steve thinks the hearings are mostly ridiculous. He knows Bucky agrees, even as he talks about how the political process and transparency are the bedrock of American democracy. It’s not that Steve doesn’t think the American people don’t deserve to know everything – it’s just that he’s pretty sure all of these hearings are just a ruse to for bored congressmen to feel like big men and get some primetime coverage. Bucky, and everyone else, has been nothing but transparent with anyone who has asked. They have nothing to hide. Steve mostly just wishes that Bucky didn’t have to spend time on this.

Bucky has had enough to do lately with the confirmation hearings for his new VP, appointing two new cabinet members, and meeting with the dozens of foreign leaders that desperately need reassurance about the continued stability of the US government. He’s been worked to the bone – Steve has seen the dark circles under his eyes that even the serum can’t hide as the days have continued to drag by.

As much as possible, Steve has tried to do his part to take some of the load off of Bucky’s shoulders. Steve’s “approval ratings” (Steve can’t get used to just how many polls Bucky’s people do) have been sky high since the photos of him doing the Triskelion clean up were all over the press and the publicity team likes taking advantage of that. Steve has gotten a crash course in polling and approval ratings and a hundred other political terms. The basics seem pretty simple, though: the more the public likes Steve, the more they like Bucky. The more that they like Bucky, the easier time that Bucky has pushing his agenda through Congress and getting out of these subcommittee hearings unscathed.

As a result, Steve has done the round of cable news talk shows and publicity events so many times that he’s pretty sure he’s beginning to go blind from the studio lights. He shows up in the Cap uniform that Tony had made for him, shield in tow, and does his best to reassure a skittish American public that everything will be just fine. Honestly, it’s easier than the USO shows so Steve doesn’t mind it all that much - even if he has to wear more makeup than in the ‘40s.

What he does mind, a little bit more anyway, is all that publicity focused on the wedding. Steve is happy (over the moon, really) about marrying Bucky – but a big, fancy wedding had never been in his plans. He’d marry Bucky in a courthouse wearing nothing but his shield harness, so getting excited about flower arrangements and table settings and lighting is beyond him. The publicity team, though, has told him that the best distraction from a tragedy is a wedding and a presidential wedding in the White House is a rare occurrence that they want to make the most of during this trying time.

“We want the public to focus on the joy of your union and not the possibility that Hydra is plotting another attack,” the perky publicity staffer had told Steve as he had prepped for an interview with Vanity Fair. “So we want to make this the wedding of the century. The polls show that the majority of the public view this as a bigger deal than Kate and William’s wedding, not to mention the last Kardashian wedding. Bucky should get a significant polling bounce from this if we play the cards right.”

Steve understands the logic, even if isn’t quite happy about it (and he had to google who Kate, William and the Kardashians were after the meeting). So, he’d at least made an effort and had gotten good at naming types of flowers and talking about china patterns and lighting choices and smiling benignly when news anchors and journalists cooed at the romance. To his dismay though, the publicist had sent over the issue of Brides magazine with Steve on the cover directly to the residence - Bucky and Sam had both laughed until they cried.

The one good thing that came out of all the “lifestyle interviews” (as Bucky’s people call them) is that Steve has gotten the chance to promote the creation of his non-profit. After discussion with Bucky and Sam, Steve had finally chosen to focus his efforts on disabled veterans and their families. His group would provide grants to help families stay nearby the hospital while their loved ones were healing, on top of paying for top of the line, cutting edge treatments that the VA wouldn’t pay for yet. They were planning on building a hospital on a beautiful lot in Virginia with long term care facilities for veterans, housing for families, and the very best in therapeutic facilities. Steve had gone out to see the plot of land a couple times - it was beautiful, with rolling green hills and lush trees. He always thought, in another life, he would’ve liked to come home to this.

His absolute favorite part of public relations, though, is when he gets to visit schools, hospitals, nursing homes, and community centers. Meeting one-on-one with real people without all the cameras and the lighting and the pointed questions is just so much better. He likes shaking people’s hands and hearing their stories. The schools are especially fun. The kids are easily awed and happy and Steve enjoys sitting with them on the floor and helping them draw. Sometimes he catches himself staring at them and wondering what it would be like to have one of his own.

Bucky is already gone by the time he gets back from his run. There is a simple black suit laid out on the bed and Steve changes into it. He combs his hair into the neat forward flip that he favors now and shaves carefully. Steve knows he’ll never be as good at this as Bucky, but he’s learning. This is the twenty-first century. He’s been extensively coached in how image matters and how what he does reflects on Bucky – the lecture had been long. Plus, he’ll officially be the First Gentleman in less than four weeks.

The Capitol steps are full of photographers and journalists and Steve has to squint into all the flashes. He’s more used to this than he was in the beginning, but it still feels claustrophobic.

“Captain Rogers, what do you have to say to those who think Natasha Romanoff should be tried for treason?”

“Captain Rogers, do you think that Hydra agents are still in the government?”

“What do you have to say to people who say you should be prosecuted for the destruction of the Triskelion?”

Steve ignores all their voices and climbs the stairs, waving briefly to the cameras.

It doesn’t get any better when Steve enters the congressional floor, everyone turning around to stare as he strides down the aisle. Maria is behind him, on loan from Bucky, and Natasha is on the other side. Sam is somewhere in the gallery but Steve makes a point to not look for him - it'll just make him nervous. Tony isn't there, but that's expected. Steve is actually due to fly to New York in two days, both to do a couple talk shows and review the plans for the new multi-story gym and hospital Tony is installing at the newly named Avengers Tower. Bucky isn't the biggest fan of the newly formed team, but he hasn't stood in Steve’s way. A couple times, Steve’s caught him looking wistfully at the diagrams himself.

As he sits down at the microphone, it almost feels like he's braced to go into battle. Back in the 40’s, he'd thought the amount of coaching he'd received was bad but it was nothing compared to the training Bucky’s people put him through now. They've held off on him doing any official speeches until after the wedding - but they've made him very aware how important his testimony today is for Bucky’s presidency. This is his first big test in the spotlight, they say.

Today, most of the questions aren’t bad – just variations of things he’s been asked a hundred times before on the cable news channels and been prepped for extensively by the PR team. He answers them smoothly, keeps his tone modulated and his gaze even like they've coached.

But, then, “Captain Rogers, what is your response to those who say that President Barnes should be impeached on the grounds that his enhanced physiology was created by Hydra and he could feel that he owes them a debt?”

Steve clears his throat and pulls at all his publicity training to keep his face calm. He can’t stop clenching his jaw though even as he leans toward the microphone. “Congressman, in World War II, President Barnes was experimented on by a Hydra scientist. He did not sign up for the experiments. He was a victim. When I pulled him off that table, I thought he was still going to die. Any other man would’ve gone home after that but Buck – President Barnes joined the Howling Commandos and dedicated himself to helping root out Hydra for the rest of the war. He lost his arm capturing the Hydra scientist who experimented on him. President Barnes is the best man I know. The only debt that President Barnes thinks he owes Hydra is their absolute destruction.”

 


	10. The happy ending.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A wedding.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, here we are at the end! Thank you for all your lovely feedback throughout. I’ve valued it so much. 
> 
> I have a few more one-shots and at least one full fledged story in this universe already in my head. We’ll see how quickly/slowly they get written since I have other stuff I’m work on too. I’ve added this to a series, so feel free to subscribe to that if you want updates for additional works. 
> 
> Please check out the cover art (linked at the bottom) that stuckypocketguide made for me!

_The happy ending._

 

The day when Steve and Bucky finally get married is perfect. No aliens come crashing through the sky. No terrorists bomb any buildings. No strange portals open up to worlds unknown. Sitting on the cusp of summer and fall, the day is beautiful. The sun shines brightly over Washington D.C., the sky is completely cloudless and the White House gardens have never looked so lovely in Bucky’s estimation. 

Early that morning. before all the guests arrive, Steve and Bucky walk the aisle by themselves. Workers are still scurrying around in the background, hanging up silver and blue streamers between red roses (Steve’s still a little bitter that they managed to sneak some red, white, and blue in) and setting up a white gazebo at the front of the aisle. The chairs are all empty and the White House photographer is the only one with a camera, for now.

Later, there will be dignitaries and press and friends and family filling up the gardens and rows of chairs in celebration of their marriage. All the major networks are carrying the ceremony live, with replays expected during primetime. The broadcast is expected to top the Super Bowl in total viewers. It’s a lot of pressure. Even before the ceremony starts, he and Steve are expected to record a short video from up on the balcony, thanking the American public for their support of their marriage. This ceremony belongs to the whole country more than it does to them.

After the ceremony, there will be a reception with even more dignitaries and press. Bucky and Steve will both be expected to make the rounds and shake hands and pose for photos for hours. Rolling Stone is doing an entire feature just focusing on their wedding and they’ve promised to sit down with the reporter for 20 minutes right after the ceremony to do the interview.

They won’t get much of a break in the coming weeks either. Bucky has a climate summit to attend in Europe in four days and a speech at the UN in eight days, on top of all his normal obligations. Beyond that, there’s a State of the Union scheduled in just a couple weeks and the first drafts of the speech will be on his desk in days. Steve will be flying down to New York with Sam and Natasha in three days to review some of the plans for the training facilities Tony has been setting up in his tower over the last few weeks. As soon as Steve gets back to Washington D.C., he’s meeting with White House communications team to finalize the launch of his non-profit. Shortly after that, both Steve and Bucky are expected to fly to the United Kingdom for Steve’s first official trip abroad as the First Gentleman. Then, right after they get home from that, they will be hosting the delegation from Wakanda for a formal state visit to the White House, in hopes of convincing them to open up additional trade routes.

It’s not until right around Christmas that they’ll have six days off together at the same time. The plan right now is for them to go to Camp David and finally, finally, finally have something that resembles a honeymoon. That is, as much as a honeymoon as they can have with a full Secret Service detail and White House staff. In complete truth, neither of them are expecting a real honeymoon until after Bucky leaves office.

Camp David will be a nice break through. There’s a fireplace, a huge sunken tub, an art studio, and a giant bed. It’s something for them both to hold onto as they face the next, long weeks apart.

But for now, these moments in the early morning light on the day of their wedding, while the staff is still setting up and everyone else is just waking up – this will be just for them.

They’re both in jeans and t-shirts for now. Steve’s hair is soft, gel free for now. He’d brought Bucky breakfast in bed and they had sat cross legged on the king mattress, sharing chocolate croissants and orange juice. It had been perfect. After, they had taken their coffee out to Truman balcony. The soft chairs lining the railing have fast become one of Steve’s favorite places. Bucky’s lost count of the time he’s come home to find Steve curled, big frame strangely small, in one of the chairs, sometimes reading and sometimes just staring out over the city. On the morning of their wedding, they had leaned against the railing together, kissing slowly in the dawning light. When the sun had been fully up, they had come down here to see the gardens.

“This isn’t how I ever imagined this,” Steve says, eyes closed and face tilted back so that the sun is bright across his cheeks.

Bucky thinks he looks like an angel. “Yeah? What’s missing? I can go get the Liberty Bell from Philadelphia to toll over our nuptials. I can go get the Hope diamond from the Smithsonian for your wedding ring. We can tote Mt. Rushmore over here so Teddy Roosevelt can watch us seal the knot. Whatever you want.” He’s joking, mostly. There’s not many things he would refuse to do if Steve asked.

Steve gives him a look: it’s the one he perfected when he was 12 and he knew Bucky was teasing him and he was annoyed. The more things change, Bucky thinks fondly, the more they stay exactly the same.

“I’m being serious here, Buck,” Steve says, in his super serious Captain America voice. “I just... back when we were kids, I always thought I’d be watching you get married to some girl and I’d be standing at your side as your best man. I thought you’d have kids and a little house near the docks and I’d live nearby and babysit your kids for you now and then. And, I was happy with that life. I was really really happy – but that was the only wedding I ever imagined.

“And then, with Peggy, I knew she wasn’t the type to want the flowers and the fuss, so I thought we’d just go to the courthouse and you’d be standing up there with me and then you’d get married and we’d live next door each other for the rest of our lives.” Steve laughs, just a little. “My dreams were so small.”

They stop at the top of the aisle and Steve turns to face him, taking both of Bucky’s hands in his own. “What I’m saying is, I could never have imagined any of this. It was a different world back then and I was happy with whatever we had. But, this.” Steve leans so their foreheads touch and Bucky can see how his long lashes fall against his cheeks. “Bucky Barnes, you’ve made every single one of my absolutely wildest dreams come true. Being here with you, I can’t imagine a greater gift.”

“You’re a sap, Rogers,” Bucky says. “Bet you say that to all the pretty fellows.”

“Just you and Sam,” Steve says teasingly.

“Knew I should be jealous of Birdboy.” Bucky smiles and he’s so happy he can’t even breathe for a second. “C’mere.” He takes Steve’s shirt in both hands, pulls him close, and plants a smacking kiss on his smiling mouth. “I know this is more public than either of us ever wanted. But, I swear, in three to seven years, when I’m out of office, we’ll do something small on a beach somewhere. Just us and the priest. Then we’ll go on a honeymoon. Something long and somewhere warm where there’ll be no cameras. Just us.”

“Tell me more, Mr. President.” Steve leans into him, eyelashes lowering as he plays coy.

Bucky wraps his arms around his waist, tucking himself down so that his head fits under Steve’s chin. “We’ll stay in a place with one of those huge hot tubs. One that’s even big enough for your ridiculous legs. Remember that bath when we were kids? Your skinny ass couldn’t even fit in it right.”

Steve laughs, buries his face in Bucky’s shoulder. “Yeah and the water was always cold and smelled funny.”

“No more of that. Hot tubs. With bubbles. Bath oils. Scented candles. Rose petals.”

“The twenty-first century has spoiled you, Buck, used to be you were happy with just a half an orange and a jazz record. Now look at you with your fancy scented oils and flowers.”

“Well, then let me spoil you a little.” Bucky grips him tight. “I spent years, Steve, just wishing I could show you some of the things in the future. Now I get that chance. You’ll just have to deal with that.”

“And that’s going on Instagram for sure,” Tony says smugly from behind them. “Should I give it an artistic caption?”

“Tony.” Steve sounds stern but he also doesn’t move from Bucky’s arms.

“No, you’re right. Pictures speak louder than words. And, there it goes. That’ll go viral for sure.” Tony slips his phone back in his pocket and claps his hands. “Shouldn’t you two be getting ready by now?”

“We just wanted to enjoy the quiet,” Steve says pointedly.

“Uh-huh, Bridezilla. You’re not fooling anyone. You know your security will see you if you try to have a quickie in the aisle.” Smirking at both of them, Tony flops down on one of the chairs in the front row, waving his hands at them. “Go on, crazy kids. People are going to start yelling if this ceremony is running late.”

Things get a bit chaotic after that. Bucky only catches glimpses of Steve throughout the next few hours as they’re both hustled from place to place. Bucky ends up in the Oval Office briefly, dealing with an unexpected change to the lineup for the climate summit, arguing with France over who the keynote will be, and the next time he sees Steve is when they sit down to record their video message.

Steve looks a bit harried when he arrives. He’s in his suit pants, but not his jacket and one of his shirt sleeves is undone. He’s also just in his socks - but the camera won’t catch that. They sit down together on the balcony and Bucky patiently pulls Steve’s wrist over into his lap, doing up his cufflinks while Steve goes over their script. The camera starts rolling a few seconds later, the staffer behind the camera tapping his watch.

“Hi, this is Bucky and Steve, and we just want to extend our thanks for all the well wishes and congratulations that so many of you have sent us.” Bucky squeezes Steve’s hand.

“And, thank you to everyone who has already donated to the Wounded Warriors Project and the USO and the Red Cross for our wedding day. It means the world to us that so many of you would do that.” Steve smiles, glances sidelong at Bucky, but Bucky can still feel him vibrating with tension against his side.

“Today, as Steve and I get married, we’d also like to remind everyone that love is love. Thank you and God bless America.” The camera clicks off and Bucky turns to kiss Steve lightly. “Don’t forget this is supposed to be a good day, alright?”

He’s been so proud of Steve these last few weeks, watching him stand up to the news media and congress. Steve has been poised and confident – the captain that America needs, Bucky had seen one anchor say. Every day, watching Steve figure out his way through this century and the sharks of the political world, Bucky’s blown away all over again over the magnificence of this man.

His words calm Steve and he settles briefly against Bucky, smelling of cologne and coffee. “You’re right,” he murmurs. “Also, just so you know, I don’t care about seating arrangements. At all. Why can’t we sit the Majority House leader and the Minority Whip side by side? I keep hearing about this partisan cooperation.”

Bucky laughs and then he’s pulled away again.

The last time he sees Steve before the ceremony is after Bucky’s completely ready for the ceremony. His suit is on, every hair in place, and a white spray of flowers is pinned to his lapel. Bucky walks into the room that leads out to the veranda overlooking the gardens and sees Steve sitting near the window.

His fiancé looks beautiful and well polished, ready to walk down the aisle. Peggy is sitting next to him, holding both his hands tightly in her wrinkled ones. She’s in a dark blue and cream dress, her hair a white halo around her. Steve is bent forward so their foreheads are almost touching and they’re whispering to each other, so low that Bucky can’t even hear it. Bucky steps back, feeling like an intruder in a very private moment.

“I owe Peggy a debt that I can’t ever repay,” Steve had told him just a couple weeks ago, “she kept you safe while I was in the ice.”

Outside the room, Bucky can hear the staff and guests bustling around, finishing up the final touches. Things are quiet here and Bucky takes a moment to just watch them whisper to each other. His mind drifts to what could’ve been, running over the strange path that has led them here. His thoughts are broken when Steve looks up and spots him, smiling brilliantly. Bucky smiles back and slips out onto the veranda, leaving them to have this moment together.

The ceremony doesn’t run late. At two pm sharp, all the seats are filled and the string quartet has started playing. All the press has been carefully cordoned to the sides and the immense amount of security has been carefully concealed in the surrounding shrubbery.

In the front row, Tony sits with Rhodes and Pepper, legs crossed like he’s most important person there. Behind him, the entire Barnes family is spread out like a wave, nephews and nieces and babies and teenagers.

Becca walks Bucky up the aisle first. Her white hair is pulled back in a jeweled clip and Bucky thinks she looks exactly like a fairytale princess. He kisses both her cheeks and helps her sit down before he stands next to the Chief Justice under the white trellis. His one flesh hand is trembling just a little and he carefully tugs on the bottom of his light gray jacket.

Neither of them is wearing white today. It had been a topic of much contention among all the stylists whether one, both, or neither of them should wear white (just like the argument over whether or not Steve was going to take the last name Barnes). Ultimately, they had gone with dove gray for Bucky and black pinstripe for Steve, careful neutrals in an effort not to offend anyone (and Steve had kept his own last name). Bucky, personally, thinks that people will be offended no matter what – but he thinks Steve has never looked better than he has today.

Natasha and Sam walk up the aisle together, both wearing black, and take their place on either side of Bucky.

Two weeks ago, when the wedding planning had really started in earnest, Bucky had come back to find Sam and Steve collapsed on their couch in the living room, eating a dozen sample wedding cakes and finger foods and watching _Die Hard_. Steve had been soft and relaxed but when he had gotten up to use the bathroom, Sam had leaned over.

“You know,” he had said conversationally (he had been suspiciously quick to break the habit of calling Bucky “Mr. President”). “Steve doesn’t have many people in this world. I figure Peggy Carter should be the one giving this speech – but I can provide back up. If you hurt Steve, I’ll come for you.”

Bucky had stared at him, a bit dumbfounded. “Did you just threaten the President of the United States? You know that there’s probably snipers trained on you right now, birdbrain.”

Now, in his black tux, Sam winks at him and gives him a thumbs up. Bucky resists the urge to roll his eyes back. That really wouldn’t be very presidential and the entire nation is watching after all.

Then, Bucky looks up and sees Steve at the other end of the aisle in his black pinstripe tux. The moment stretches out between them, long and slow. Steve is smiling a little, surrounded by blue sky and sun. He looks like something out of a fairy tale, shining so brightly that everything else around him seems to dim by comparison.

The music changes and Bucky’s eyes are drawn to the end of the aisle. Peggy and Steve are there together, still curved toward each other like two parentheses. She’s having a good day today and her eyes are gleaming with fresh, happy tears. They start walking and her hand is wrapped tightly around Steve’s arm. They go really slow down the aisle so she doesn’t have to use her cane.

Steve is crying, eyes red and nose puffy, and the sun is catching the wet streaks on his cheeks. He has always been something of an ugly crier, Bucky thinks with infinite fondness.

When they get to the end of the aisle, Steve bends down and Peggy takes his face in both of her hands. She says something against his cheek that Bucky can’t hear and rubs her thumbs at the wetness beneath Steve’s eyes. Steve nods and kisses her cheek before helping her sit down in the front row. Then, he turns back and their gazes lock.

Lifetimes go by in that moment. Stars are born and die. The rest of the garden falls away into dust and all Bucky can see is Steve: Steve as he is now, Steve as he was 70, 80, and 90 years ago. The whole of his long life stretches before him, from Brooklyn to Europe to a cold grave in the Atlantic to the banks of the Potomac, and he thinks that no moment in his life has mattered more than this point in time. He has to take a deep breath before he starts crying himself.

Steve smiles and it’s brilliant, even with his nose all puffy and his eyes swollen. “Hello,” he says under his breath as he steps up to stand across from Bucky, taking his hands.

Bucky can barely hear the Justice talking about love and loyalty and fate. His blood is thrumming loudly in his ears and he keeps telling himself to remember this, remember everything, remember every single moment.

But all he can see is Steve.

The end.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Art for "No Faraway Shore"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8171662) by [stuckypocketguide (PocketGuideTyrant)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PocketGuideTyrant/pseuds/stuckypocketguide)




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